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THE  LIBRARY  OF  THE 
UNIVERSITY  OF 
NORTH  CAROLINA 


C 
(T 

e 

A 

PR1i842 

.H9 

1886 


ENDOWED  BY  THE 
DIALECTIC  AND  PHILANTHROPIC 
SOCIETIES 


FROM  “THE  SAINT'S  TRA 

By  Charles  Kingsley.  ; 

O,  that  we  two  were  maying^ 
Down  the  stream  of  the  sof 
breeze, 

Like  children  with'  violets  play 
In  the  shade  of  the  whispering  1 

i 

O,  that  we  two  sat  dreaming 
On  the  sward  of  some  sheep 
down, 

Watching  the  white  mist  steat 
Over  river,  and  mead,  and  town. 

'  O,  that  we  two  lay  sleeping 
In  our  nest  in  the  churchyard  a( 
With  our  limbs  at  rest  on  i 
earth’s  breast. 

And  our  souls  at  home  with  Oo 


I  THE  “OLD,  OLD  SCf 

j  By  Charles  Kingsley. 

Whexi  all  the  world  is  young, 
and  all  the  trees  are  green; 

;  And  every  goose  a  swan,  lad, 
And  every  lass  a  queen; 

,  Then  hey  for  boot  and  horse, 

I  And  round  the  Avorld  away; 
j  Young  blood  must  have  its  coti 
And  every  dog  his  day. 


When  all  the  world  is  old,  Um, 

And  all  the  trees  are  brown; 

And  all  the  sport  is  stale,  lad, 

And  all  the  wheels  run  down; 

Creep  home,  and  take  your  place  there. 
The  spent  and  maimed  among; 
grant  you  fmd  one  face  there 
V[You  loved  when  all  was  young. 


THE  LIBRARY  OF  THE 
UNIVERSTTY  OF 
NORTH  CAROLINA 


From  the  Library  of 
GERTRUDE  WEIL 
1879-1971 


HYPATIA 


OB 


NEW  EOES  WITH  AN  OLD  EACE 


Wjtvv  YORK: 

HURST  &  CO.,  PUBLISHERS^ 

NO.  122  NASSAU  STREET. 


DEDIOATIOM’ 


TO  MY  FATHEE  AND  MY  MOTHER 

My  deak  Parents, — 

When  you  sliall  have  read  this  book,  and  considered  the 
view  of  human  relationships  which  is  set  forth  in  it,  you 
will  be  at  no  loss  to  discover  why  I  have  dedicated  it  to 
you,  as  one  paltry  witness  of  a  union  and  of  a  debt  which, 
though  they  may  seem  to  have  begun  with  birth,  and  to 
have  grown  with  your  most  loving  education,  yet  cannot  die 
with  death  :  but  are  spiritual,  indefeasible,  eternal  in  the 
heavens  with  that  God  from  whom  every  fatherhood  in  heaven 
and  earth  is  named. 


C.  K. 


PREFACE. 


A  PICTURE  of  life  in  the  fifth  century  must  needs  contain  much 
which  will  be  painful  to  any  reader,  and  which  the  young  and  inno¬ 
cent  will  do  well  to  leave  altogether  unread.  It  has  to  represent  a 
very  hideous,  though  a  very  great,  age;  one  of  those  critical  and  car¬ 
dinal  eras  in  the  history  of  the  human  race,  in  which  virtues  and 
vices  manifest  themselves  side  by  side — even,  at  times,  in  the  same 
person — with  the  most  startling  openness  and  power.  One  who  writes 
of  such  an  era  labors  under  a  troublesome  disadvantage.  He  dare 
not  tell  how  evil  people  were  ;  he  will  not  be  believed  if  he  tells  how 
good  they  were.  In  the  present  case  that  disadvantage  is  doubled  ; 
for,  while  the  sins  of  the  Church,  however  heinous,  were  still  such 
as  admit  of  being  expressed  in  words,  the  sins  of  the  heathen  world 
against  which  she  fought  were  utterly  indescribable  ;  and  the  Chris¬ 
tian  apologist  is  thus  compelled,  for  the  sake  of  decency,  to  state  the 
Church’s  case  far  more  weakly  than  the  facts  deserve. 

Not,  be  it  ever  remembered,  that  the  slightest  suspicion  of  immor¬ 
ality  attaches  either  to  the  heroine  of  this  book,  or  to  the  leading 
philosophers  of  her  school,  for  several  centuries.  Howsoever  base 
and  profligate  their  disciples,  or  the  Manichees,  may  have  been,  the 
great  Neo-Platonists  were  as  Manes  himself  was,  persons  of  the 
most  rigid  and  ascetic  virtue. 

For  a  time  had  arrived,  in  which  no  teacher  who  did  not  put  forth 
the  most  lofty  pretensions  to  righteousness  could  expect  a  hearing. 
That  Divine  Word,  who  is  “  the  Light  who  lighteth  every  man  which 
cometh  into  the  world,”  had  awakened  in  the  heart  of  mankind  a 
moral  craving  never  before  felt  in  any  strength,  except  by  a  few  iso¬ 
lated  philosophers  or  prophets.  The  Spirit  had  been  poured  out  on 
all  flesh  ;  and  from  one  end  of  the  empire  to  the  other,  from  the 
slave  in  the  mill  to  the  emperor  on  his  throne,  all  hearts  were  either 
hungering  and  thirsting  after  righteousness,  or  learning  to  do  hom¬ 
age  to  those  who  did  so.  And  He  who  excited  the  craving  was  also 
furnishing  that  which  would  satisfy  it ;  and  was  teaching  mankind, 
by  a  long  and  painful  education,  to  distinguish  the  truth  from  its 
innumerable  counterfeits,  and  to  find,  for  the  first  time  in  the  world’s 
life,  a  good  news,  not  merely  for  the  select  few,  but  for  all  mankind, 
Without  respect  of  rank  or  race. 


vi 


PREFACE. 


For  soinewliat  more  tlian  four  liundred  years,  the  Roman  Empire 
and  the  Christian  Church,  born  into  the  world  almost  at  the  same 
moment,  had  been  developing  themselves  side  by  side  as  two  great 
rival  powers,  in  deadly  struggle  for  the  possession  of  the  human 
race.  The  weapons  of  the  Empire  had  been,  not  merely  an  over¬ 
whelming  physical  force,  and  a  ruthless  lust  of  aggressive  conquest, 
but,  even  more  powerful  still,  an  unequaled  genius  for  organization, 
and  an  uniform  system  of  external  law  and  order.  This  was  gener¬ 
ally  a  real  boon  to  conquered  nations,  because  it  substituted  a  fixed 
and  regular  spoliation  for  the  fGituitous  and  arbitrary  miseries  of 
savage  warfare  ;  but  it  arrayed,  meanwhile,  on  the  side  of  the  Em¬ 
pire  the  wealthier  citizens  ^  ^jvery  province,  by  allowing  them  their 
share  in  the  plunder  of  the  laboring  masses  below  them.  These,  in 
the  country  districts,  were  utterly  enslaved,  while,  in  the  cities,  their 
nominal  freedom  was  of  little  use  to  masses  kept  from  starvation  by 
the  alms  of  the  government,  and  drugged  into  brutish  good  humor 
by  a  vast  system  of  public  spectacles,  in  which  the  realms  of  nature 
and  of  art  were  ransacked  to  glut  the  wonder,  lust,  and  ferocity  of  a 
degraded  populace. 

Against  this  vast  organization  the  Church  had  been  fighting  for 
now  four  hundred  years,  armed  only  with  its  own  mighty  and  all- 
embracing  message,  and  with  the  manifestation  of  a  spirit  of  purity 
and  virtue,  of  love  and  self-sacrifice,  which  had  proved  itself  mightier 
to  melt  and  weld  together  the  hearts  of  men,  than  all  the  force  and 
terror,  all  the  mechanical  organization,  all  the  sensual  baits,  with 
which  the  Empire  had  been  contending  against  that  Gospel,  in 
which  it  had  recognized,  instinctively  and  at  first  sight,  its  interne¬ 
cine  foe. 

And  now  the  Church  had  conquered.  The  weak  things  of  this 
world  had  confounded  the  strong.  In  spite  of  the  devilish  cruelties 
of  persecutors  ;  in  spite  of  the  contaminating  atmosphere  of  sin 
which  surrounded  her ;  in  spite  of  having  to  form  herself,  not  out  of 
a  race  of  pure  and  separate  creatures,  but  by  a  most  literal  “  new 
birth  ”  out  of  those  very  fallen  masses  who  insulted  and  persecuted 
her  ;  in  spite  of  having  to  endure  within  herself  continual  outbursts 
of  the  evil  passions  in  which  her  members  had  once  indulged  with¬ 
out  check  ;  in  spite  of  a  thousand  counterfeits  which  sprung  up 
around  her  and  within  her,  claiming  to  be  parts  of  her,  and  alluring 
men  to  themselves  by  that  very  exclusiveness  and  party  arrogance 
which  disproved  their  claim  ;  in  spite  of  all,  she  had  conquered. 
The  very  emperors  had  arrayed  themselves  on  her  side.  Julian’s  last 
attempt  to  restore  paganism  by  imperial  influence  had  only  proved 
that  the  old  faith  had  lost  all  hold  upon  the  hearts  of  the  masses  ; 
and  at  his  death  the  great  tide- wave  of  new  opinion  rolled  on  un¬ 
checked,  and  the  rulers  of  earth  were  fain  to  swim  with  the  stream  ; 
to  accept,  in  words  at  least,  the  Church’s  laws  as  theirs  ;  to  acknowl¬ 
edge  a  King  of  kings  to  whom  even  they  owed  homage  and  obedience ; 


and  to  call  tlieir  own  slaves  tlieir  “  poorer  brethren,”  and  often,  too, 
their  “spiritual  superiors.” 

But  if  the  emperors  had  become  Christian,  the  Empire  had  not. 
Here  and  there  an  abuse  was  lopped  off ;  or  an  edict  was  passed  for 
the  visitation  of  prisons  and  for  the  welfare  of  prisoners  ;  or  a  Theo¬ 
dosius  was  recalled  to  justice  and  humanity  for  a  while  by  the  stern 
rebukes  of  an  Ambrose.  But  the  Empire  was  still  the  same  ;  still  a 
great  tyranny,  enslaving  the  masses,  crushing  national  life,  fattening 
itself  and  its  officials  on  a  system  of  world-wide  robbery  ;  and  while 
it  was  paramount,  there  could  be  no  hope  for  the  human  race.  Nay, 
there  were  even  those  among  the  Christians  who  saw,  like  Dante 
afterward,  in  the  “  fatal  gift  of  Constantine,”  and  the  truce  between 
the  Church  and  the  Empire,  fresh  and  more  deadly  danger.  Was 
not  the  Empire  trying  to  extend  ver  the  Church  itself  that  upas 
shadow  with  which  it  had  withered  up  every  other  form  of  human 
existence  ;  to  make  her,  too,  its  stipendiary  slave-official,  to  be  pam¬ 
pered  when  obedient,  and  scourged  whenever  she  dare  assert  a  free 
will  of  her  own,  a  law  beyond  that  of  her  tyrants  ;  to  throw  on  her, 
by  a  refined  hypocrisy,  the  care  and  support  of  the  masses  on  whose 
life-blood  it  was  feeding?  So  thought  many  then,  and,  as  I  fancy, 
not  unwisely. 

But  if  the  social  condition  of  the  civilized  world  was  anomalous  at 
the  beginning  of  the  fifth  ceiftury,  its  spiritual  state  was  still  more 
so.  The  universal  fusion  of  races,  languages,  and  customs,  which 
had  gone  on  for  four  centuries  under  the  Roman  rule,  had  produced  a 
corresponding  fusion  of  creeds,  an  universal  fermentation  of  human 
thought  and  faith.  All  honest  belief  in  the  old  local  superstitions 
of  paganism  had  been  long  dying  out  before  the  more  palpable  and 
material  idolatry  of  Emperor- worship  ;  and  the  gods  of  the  nations, 
unable  to  deliver  those  who  had  trusted  in  them,  became,  one  by 
one,  the  vassals  of  the  “  Divus  Caesar,”  neglected  by  the  philosophic 
rich,  and  only  worshiped  by  the  lower  classes,  where  the  old  rites 
still  pandered  to  their  grosser  appetites,  or  subserved  the  wealth  and 
importance  of  some  particular  locality. 

In  the  meanwhile,  the  minds  of  men,  cut  adrift  from  their  ancient 
moorings,  wandered  wildly  over  pathless  seas  of  speculative  doubt, 
and,  especially  in  the  more  metaphysical  and  contemplative  East, 
attempted  to  solve  for  themselves  the  questions  of  man’s  relation  to 
the  unseen  by  those  thousand  schisms,  heresies,  and  theosophies  (it 
is  a  disgrace  to  the  word  philosophy  to  call  them  by  it),  on  the  records 
of  which  the  student  now  gazes  bewildered,  unable  alike  to  count  oi 
to  explain  their  fantasies. 

Yet  even  these,  like  every  outburst  of  free  human  thought,  had 
their  use  and  their  fruit.  They  brought  before  the  minds  of  Church¬ 
men  a  thousand  new  questions  which  must  be  solved,  unless  the 
Church  was  to  relinquish  forever  her  claims  as  the  great  teacher  and 
satisfier  of  the  human  soul.  To  study  these  bubbles,  as  they  formed 


PREFACE. 


• « • 

viu 

and  burst  on  every  wave  of  human  life  ;  to  feel,  too  often  by  sad  ex¬ 
perience,  as  Augustine  knew,  the  charm  of  their  allurements  ;  to 
eliminate  the  truths  at  which  they  aimed  from  the  falsehood  which 
they  offered  as  its  substitute  ;  to  exhibit  the  Catholic  Church  as  pos¬ 
sessing,  in  the  great  facts  which  she  proclaimed,  full  satisfaction, 
even  for  the  most  subtle  metaphysical  cravings  of  a  diseased  age  ; — 
that  was  the  work  of  the  time ;  and  men  were  sent  to  do  it,  and 
aided  in  their  labor  by  the  very  causes  which  had  produced  the  intel¬ 
lectual  revolution.  The  general  intermixture  of  ideas,  creeds,  and 
races,  even  in  the  m,ere  physical  facilities  for  intercourse  between 
different  parts  of  the  Empire,  helped  to  give  the  great  Christian 
fathers  of  the  fourth  and  fifth  centuries  a  breadth  of  observation,  a 
depth  of  thought,  a  large-hearted  and  large-minded  patience  and 
tolerance,  such  as,  we  may  say  boldly,  the  Church  has  since  beheld 
but  rarely,  and  the  world  never-;  at  least,  if  we  are  to  judge  those 
great  men  by  what  they  had,  and  not  by  what  they  had  not,  and  to 
believe,  as  w^e  are  bound,  that  had  they  lived  now,  and  not  then, 
they  would  have  towered  as  far  above  the  heads  of  this  generation 
as  they  did  above  the  heads  of  their  own.  And  thus  an  age,  which, 
to  the  shallow  insight  of  a  sneerer  like  Gibbon,  seems  only  a  rot¬ 
ting  and  aimless  chaos  of  sensuality  and  anarchy,  fanaticism  and 
hypocrisy,  produced  an  Athanase  and  a  Jerome,  a  Chrysostom  and  an 
Augustine  ;  absorbed  into  the  sphere  of  Christianity  all  which  was 
most  valuable  in  the  philosophies  of  Greece  and  Egypt,  and  in  the 
social  organization  of  Rome,  as  an  heirloom  for  nations  yet  unborn  ; 
and  laid  in  foreign  lands,  by  unconscious  agents,  the  foundations  of 
all  European  thought  and  ethics. 

But  the  health  of  a  Church  depends  not  merely  on  the  creed  which 
it  professes,  not  even  on  the  wisdom  and  holiness  of  a  few  great 
ecclesiastics,  but  on  the  faith  and  virtue  of  its  individual  members. 
The  mens  sana  must  have  a  corpus  sanum  to  inhabit.  And  even  for 
the  Western  Church,  the  lofty  future  which  was  in  store  for  it  would 
have  been  impossible,  without  some  infusion  of  new  and  healthier 
blood  into  the  veins  of  a  world  drained  and  tainted  by  the  influence  of 
Rome. 

And  the  new  blood,  at  the  era  of  this  story,  was  at  hand.  The 
great  tide  of  those  Gothic  nations,  of  which  the  Norwegian  and  the 
German  are  the  purest  remaining  types,  though  every  nation  of 
Europe,  from  Gibraltar  to  St.  Petersburg,  owes  to  them  the  most 
precious  elements  of  strength,  was  sweeping  onward,  wave  over 
wave,  in  a  steady  south-western  current,  across  the  Roman  territory, 
and  only  stopping  and  recoiling  when  it  reached  the  shores  of  the 
Mediterranean.  Those  wild  tribes  were  bringing  with  them  into  the 
magic  circle  of  the  Western  Church’s  influence  the  very  materials 
which  she  required  for  the  building  up  of  a  future  Christendom,  and 
which  she  could  find  as  little  in  the  Western  Empire  as  in  the  East¬ 
ern  ; — comparative  purity  of  morals  ;  sacred  respect  for  woman,  for 


PREFACE 


ix 


family  life,  for  law,  equal  justice,  individual  freedom,  and,  above  all, 
for  lionesty  in  word  and  deed  ;  bodies  untainted  by  hereditary  effemi¬ 
nacy,  hearts  earnest  though  genial,  and  blest  with  a  strange  willing¬ 
ness  to  learn,  even  from  those  whom  they  despised  ;  a  brain  equal  to 
that  of  the  Roman  in  practical  power,  and  not  too  far  behind  that 
of  the  Eastern  in  imaginative  and  speculative  acuteness. 

And  their  strength  was  felt  at  once.  Their  van-guard,  confined 
with  difficulty  for  three  centuries  beyond  the  Eastern  Alps,  at  the 
expense  of  sanguinary  wars,  had  been  adopted,  wherever  it  was 
practicable,  into  the  service  of  the  Empire  ;  and  the  heart’s  core  of 
the  Roman  legions  was  composed  of  Gothic  officers  and  soldiers. 
But  now  the  main  body  had  arrived.  Tribe  after  tribe  was  crowding 
down  to  the  Alps,  and  trampling  upon  each  other  on  the  frontiers  of 
the  Empire.  The  Huns,  singly  their  inferiors,  pressed  them  from  be¬ 
hind  with  the  irresistible  weight  of  numbers  ;  Italy,  with  her  rich 
cities  and  fertile  lowlands,  beckoned  them  on  to  plunder  ;  as  auxil¬ 
iaries,  they  had  learned  their  own  strength  and  Roman  weakness  ;  a 

casus  belli  was  soon  found . How  iniquitous  was  the  conduct  of  the 

sons  of  Theodosius,  in  refusing  the  usual  bounty,  by  which  the  Goths 
were  bribed  not  to  attack  the  Empire  !  The  whole  pent-up  deluge 
burst  over  the  plains  of  Italy,  and  the  Western  Empire  became  from 
that  day  forth  a  dying  idiot,  while  the  new  invaders  divided  Europe 
among  themselves.  The  fifteen  years  before  the  time  of  this  tale  had 
decided  the  fate  of  Greece  ;  the  last  four,  that  of  Rome  itself.  The 
countless  treasures  which  five  centuries  of  rapine  had  accumulated 
round  the  Capitol  had  become  the  prey  of  men  clothed  in  sheep-skins 
and  horse-hide  ;  and  the  sister  of  an  emperor  had  found  her  beauty, 
virtue,  and  pride  of  race  worthily  matched  by  those  of  the  hard-handed 
Northern  hero  who  led  her  away  from  Italy  as  his  captive  and  his 
bride,  to  found  new  kingdoms  in  South  France  and  Spain,  and  to 
drive  th«  newly-arrived  Vandals  across  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar  into 
the  ffien  blooming  coastland  of  Northern  Africa.  Everywhere  the 
mangled  limbs  of  the  Old  World  were  seething  in  the  Medea’s  caldron, 
to  come  forth  whole,  and  young,  and  strong.  The  Longbeards, 
noblest  of  their  race,  had  found  a  temporary  resting-place  upon  the 
Austrian  frontier,  after  long  southward  wanderings  from  the  Swedish 
mountains,  soon  to  be  dispossessed  again  by  the  advancing  Huns, 
and,  crossing  the  Alps,  to  give  their  name  forever  to  the  plains  of 
Lombardy.  A  few  more  tumultuous  years,  and  the  Franks  would 
find  themselves  lords  of  the  Lower  Rhineland  ;  and  before  the  hairs 
of  Hypatia’s  scholars  had  grown  gray,  the  mythic  Hengst  and  Horsa 
would  have  landed  on  the  shores  of  Kent,  and  an.  English  nation 
have  begun  its  world-wide  life. 

But  some  great  Providence  forbade  to  our  race,  triumphant  in  every 
other  quarter,  a  footing  beyond  the  Mediterranean,  or  even  in  Con¬ 
stantinople,  which  to  this  day  preserves  in  Europe  the  faith  and  man 
ners  of  Asia.  The  Eastern  World  seemed  barred,  by  some  stern 


X 


PREFACE, 


doom,  from  the  only  influence  which  could  have  regenerated  it. 
Every  attempt  of  the  Gothic  races  to  establish  themselves  beyond  the 
sea, — whether  in  the  form  of  an  organized  kingdom,  as  did  the  Van¬ 
dals  in  Africa  ;  or  of  a  mere  band  of  brigands,  as  did  the  Goths  in 
Asia  Minor,  under  Gainas  ;  or  of  a  pretorian  guard,  as  did  the  Va¬ 
rangians  of  the  Middle  Age  ;  or  as  religious  invaders,  as  did  the  Cru¬ 
saders, — ended  only  in  the  corruption  and  disappearance  of  the  colo¬ 
nists.  That  extraordinary  reform  in  morals,  which,  according  to 
Salvian  and  his  contemporaries,  the  Vandal  conquerors  worked  in 
North  Africa,  availed  them  nothing  ;  they  lost  more  than  they  gave. 
Climate,  bad  example,  and  the  luxury  of  power  degraded  them  in  one 
century  into  a  race  of  helpless  and  debauched  slaveholders,  doomed 
to  utter  extermination  before  the  semi-Gothic  armies  of  Belisarius  ; 
and  with  them  vanished  the  last  chance  that  the  Gothic  races  would 
exercise  on  the  Eastern  World  the  same  stern  yet  wholesome  disci¬ 
pline  under  which  the  Western  had  been  restored  to  life. 

The  Egyptian  and  Syrian  Churches,  therefore,  were  destined  to 
labor  not  for  themselves,  but  for  us.  The  signs  of  disease  and  de¬ 
crepitude  were  already  but  too  manifest  in  them.  That  very  peculiar 
turn  of  the  Graeco-Eastern  mind,  which  made  them  the  great  thinkers 
of  the  then  world,  had  the  effect  of  drawing  them  away  from  prac¬ 
tice  to  speculation  ;  and  the  races  of  Egypt  and  Syria  were  effeminate, 
over-civilized,  exhausted  by  centuries  during  which  no  infusion  of 
fresh  blood  had  come  to  renew  the  stock.  Morbid,  self-conscious, 
physically  indolent,  incapable  then  as  now  of  personal  or  political 
freedom,  they  afforded  material  out  of  which  fanatics  might  easily  be 
made,  but  not  citizens  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  The  very  ideas  of 
family  and  national  life — those  two  divine  roots  of  the  Church,  sev¬ 
ered  from  which  she  is  certain  to  wither  away  into  that  most  godless 
and  most  cruel  of  specters,  a  religious  world — had  perished  in  the 
East,  from  the  evil  influence  of  the  universal  practice  of  slavehold¬ 
ing,  as  well  as  from  the  degradation  of  that  Jewish  nation  which  had 
been  for  ages  the  great  witness  for  those  ideas  ;  and  all  classes,  like 
their  forefather  Adam, — like,  indeed,  “the  old  Adam’’  in  every  man 
and  in  every  age, — were  shifting  the  blame  of  sin  from  their  own 
consciences  to  human  relationships  and  duties, — and  therein,  to  the 
God  who  had  appointed  them;  and  saying  as  of  old,  The  woman 
lohom  thou  garnet  to  he  with  me,  she  gave  me  of  the  tree,  and  I  did 
eat.”  The  passionate  Eastern  character,  like  all  weak  ones,  found 
total  abstinence  easier  than  temperance,  religious  thought  more 
pleasant  than  godly  action  ;  and  a  monastic  world  grew  up  all  over 
the  East,  of  such  vastness  that  in  Egypt  it  was  said  to  rival  in  num¬ 
bers  the  lay  population,  producing,  with  an  enormous  decrease  in  the 
actual  amount  of  moral  evil,  an  equally  great  enervation  and  decrease 
of  the  population.  Such  a  people  could  offer  no  resistance  to  the 
steadily  increasing  tyranny  of  the  Eastern  Empire.  In  vain  did  such 
men  as  Chrysostom  and  Basil  oppose  their  personal  influence  to  the 


PREFACE. 


xi 


hideous  intrigues  and  villainies  of  the  Byzantine  court ;  the  ever- 
do'vnward  career  of  Eastern  Christianity  went  on  unchecked  for  two 
more  miserable  centuries,  side  by  side  with  the  upward  development 
of  the  Western  Church  ;  and  while  the  successors  of  the  great  Saint 
Gregory  ware  converting  and  civilizing  a  new-born  Europe,  the 
churches  of  the  East  were  vanishing  before  Mohammedan  invaders, 
strong  by  living  trust  in  that  living  God,  whom  the  Christians,  while 
they  hated  and  persecuted  each  other  for  arguments  about  Him,  were 
denying  and  blaspheming  in  every  action  of  their  lives. 

But  at  the  period  whereof  this  story  treats,  the  Graeco-Eastern 
mind  was  still  in  the  middle  of  its  great  work.  That  wonderful 
metaphysic  subtlety,  which  in  phrases  and  definitions  too  often  un¬ 
meaning  to  our  grosser  intellect  saw  the  symbols  of  the  most  impor¬ 
tant  spiritual  realities,  and  felt  that  on  the  distinction  between 
liomoousios  and  homoiousios'  might  hang  the  solution  of  the  whole 
problem  of  humanity,  was  set  to  battle  in  Alexandria,  the  ancient 
stronghold  of  Greek  philosophy,  with  the  effete  remains  of  the  very 
scientific  thought  to  which  it  owed  its  extraordinary  culture.  Mo¬ 
nastic  isolation  from  family  and  national  duties  especially  fitted  tlie 
fathers  of  that  period  for  the  task,  by  giving  them  leisure,  if  nothing 
else,  to  face  questions  with  a  life-long  earnestness  impossible  to  the 
more  social  and  practical  Northern  mind.  Our  duty  is,  instead  of 
sneering  at  them  as  pedantic  dreamers,  to  thank  Heaven  that  men 
were  found,  just  at  the  time  when  they  were  wanted,  to  do  for  us 
what  we  could  never  have  done  for  ourselves  ;  to  leave  to  us,  as  a 
precious  heirloom,  bought  most  truly  with  the  life-blood  of  their 
race,  a  metaphysic  at  once  Christian  and  scientific,  every  attempt  to 
improve  on  which  has  hitherto  been  found  a  failure  ;  and  to  battle 
victoriously  with  that  strange  brood  of  theoretic  monsters  begotten 
by  effete  Greek  philosophy  upon  Egyptian  symbolism,  Chaldee 
astrology,  Parsee  dualism,  Brahminic  spiritualism, — graceful  and 
gorgeous  phantoms,  whereof  somewhat  more  will  be  said  in  the  com¬ 
ing  chapters. 

I  have,  in  my  sketch  of  Hypatia  and  her  fate,  closely  followed 
authentic  history,  especially  Socrates’  account  of  the  closing  scene, 
as  given  in  Book  VII.  §  15  of  his  “  Ecclesiastical  History.”  I  am  in¬ 
clined,  however,  for  various  historical  reasons,  to  date  her  death  two 
years  earlier  than  he  does.  The  tradition  that  she  was  the  wife  of 
Isidore,  the  philosopher,  I  reject,  with  Gibbon,  as  a  palpable  an¬ 
achronism  of  at  least  fifty  years  (Isidore’s  master,  Proclus,  not  having 
been  born  till  the  year  before  Hypatia’s  death),  contradicted,  more¬ 
over,  by  Photius,  who  says  distinctly,  after  comparing  Hypatia  and 
Isidore,  that  Isidore  married  a  certain  “Domna.”  No  hint,  more¬ 
over,  of  her  having  been  married,  appears  in  any  contemporary  au¬ 
thors  ;  and  the  name  of  Isidore  nowhere  occurs  among  those  of  the 
many  mutual  friends  to  whom  Synesius  sends  messages  in  his  letters 
to  Hypatia,  in  which,  if  anywhere,  we  should  find  mention  of  a  hus- 


Xll 


PREFACE. 


band,  had  one  existed.  To  Synesius’s  most  charming  letters,  as  well 
as  to  those  of  Isidore,  the  good  Abbot  of  Pelusiiim,  I  beg  leave  to 
refer  those  readers  who  wish  for  further  information  about  the  private 
life  of  the  fifth  century. 

I  cannot  hope  that  these  pages  will  be  altogether  free  from  an¬ 
achronisms  and  errors.  I  can  only  say  that  I  have  labored  honestly 
and  industriously  to  discover  the  truth,  even  in  its  minutest  details, 
and  to  sketch  the  age,  its  manners,  and  its  literature,  as  I  found 
them, — altogether  artificial,  slipshod,  effete,  resembling  far  more  the 
times  of  Louis  Quinze  than  those  of  Sophocles  and  Plato.  And  so  I 
send  forth  this  little  sketch,  ready  to  give  my  hearty  thanks  to  any 
reviewer  who,  by  exposing  my  mistake,  shall  teach  me  and  the  pub¬ 
lic  somewhat  more  about  the  last  struggle  between  the  Young  Church 
and  the  Old  World. 


V. 


I 


CONTENTS 


PAGB 


PKEFACB .  5 

CHAPTER  I. 

THE  LAUEA .  13 

CHAPTER  H. 

THE  DYING  WORLD . 23 

CHAPTER  HI. 

THE  GOTHS .  87 

CHAPTER  IV. 

MIRIAM .  47 

CHAPTER  V. 

k 

A  DAY  IN  ALEXANDRIA . 57 

CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  NEW  DIOGENES . 76 

CHAPTER  VII. 

THOSE  BY  WHOM  OFFENSES  COME .  82 


xiv  (JONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE  EAST  WIND . 95 

CHAPTER  IX. 

THE  SNAPPING  OP  THE  BOW .  108 

CHAPTER  X. 

THE  INTERVIEW . 115 

CHAPTER  XI. 

THE  LAURA  AGAIN . 124 

CHAPTER  XII. 

THE  BOWER  OP  ACRASIA.  . .  132 

CHAPTER  XHI. 

THE  BOTTOM  OP  THE  ABYSS .  142 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

THE  ROCKS  OP  THE  SIRENS .  160 

CHAPTER  XV. 

NEPHELOCOCCUGUIA . . ,  .  .  166 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

VENUS  AND  PALLAS . . .  .  .  . .  174 

CHAPTER  XVII. 


A.  STRAY  GLEAM 


188 


(JONTmTS. 


XV 


CHAPTER  XVIII.  » 

'  ti 

THE  PKEFECT  TESTED .  195 

[CHAPTER  XIX 

JEWS  AGAINST  CHRISTIANS . 206 

CHAPTER  XX. 

SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER . 216 

CHAPTER  XXI. 

THE  SQUIRE-BISHOP .  235 

CHAPTER  XXII. 

PANDEMONIUM . 258 

CHAPTER  XXIII. 

NEMESIS .  270 

CHAPTER  XXIV. 

LOST  LAMBS .  274 

CHAPTER  XXV.  -  ? 

SEEKING  AFTER  A  SIGN .  289 

CHAPTER  XXVI. 

MIRIAM’S  PLOT . 301 

CHAPTER  XXVII. 

THE  prodigal’s  RETURN.... .  312 


xvi  contents. 

CHAPTER  XXVIII. 
woman’s  love . 

CHAPTER  XXIX. 


NEMESIS . 334 

CHAPTER  XXX. 

EVEKY  MAN  TO  HIS  OWN  PLACE . 344 


HYPATIA 


OR 

tm  FOES  WITH  AH  OLD  FACE. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE  LAURA. 

four  hundred  and  thirteenth  year  of  the  Christian  era,  some 
^hree  hundred  miles  above  Alexandria,  the  young  monk  Philammon 
was  sitting  on  the  edge  of  a  low  range  of  inland  cliffs,  crested  with 
drifting  sand.  Behind  him  the  desert  sand-waste  stretched,  lifeless, 
interminable,  reflecting  its  lurid  glare  on  the  horizon  of  the  cloudless 
vault  of  blue.  At  his  feet  the  sand  dripped  and  trickled,  in  yellow 
rivulets,  from  crack  to  crack  and  ledge  to  ledge,  or  whirled  past  him 
in  tiny  jets  of  yellow  smoke,  before  the  fitful  summer  airs.  Here 
and  there,  upon  the  face  of  the  cliffs  which  walled  in  the  opposite 
side  of  the  narrow  glen  below,  were  cavernous  tombs,  huge  old  quar¬ 
ries,  with  obelisks  and  half -cut  pillars,  standing  as  the  workmen  had 
left  them  centuries  before  ;  the  sand  was  slipping  down  and  piling 
up  around  them  ;  their  heads  were  frosted  with  the  arid  snow;  every¬ 
where  was  silence,  desolation, — the  grave  of  a  dead  nation  in  a  dying 
land.  And  there  he  sat  musing  above  it  all,  full  of  life  and  youth 
and  health  and  beauty, — a  young  Apollo  of  the  desert.  His  only 
clothing  was  a  ragged  sheep-skin,  bound  with  a  leathern  girdle.  His 
long,  black  locks,  unshorn  from  childhood,  waved  and  glistened  in 
the  sun  ;  a  rich  dark  down  on  cheek  and  chin  showed  the  spring  of 
healthful  manhood  ;  his  hard  hands,  and  sinewy,  sun-burnt  limbs, 
told  of  labor  and  endurance  ;  his  flashing  eyes  and  beetling  brow,  of 
daring,  fancy,  passion,  thought,  which  had  no  sphere  of  action  in 
such  a  place.  What  did  his  glorious  young  humanity  alone  among 
the  tombs  ? 

So  perhaps  he,  too,  thought,  as  he  passed  his  hand  across  his  brow, 

(13) 


14 


HtPATlA. 


as  if  to  sweep  awaj  some  gathering  dream,  and,  sighing,  rose  and 
wandered  along  the  cliffs,  peering  downward  at  every  point  and 
cranny,  in  search  of  fuel  for  the  monastery  from  whence  he  came. 

Simple  as  was  the  material  which  he  sought,  consisting  chiefly  of 
the  low,  arid  desert  shrubs,  with  now  and  then  a  fragment  of  wood 
from  some  deserted  quarry  or  ruin,  it  was  becoming  scarcer  and 
scarcer  round  Abbot  Pambo’s  Laura  at  Scetis,  and  long  before  Phil- 
ammon  had  collected  his  daily  quantity,  be  had  strayed  farther  from 
his  home  than  he  had  ever  been  before. 

Suddenly,  at  a  turn  of  the  glen,  he  came  upon  a  sight  new  to  him 
...  .a  temple  carven  in  the  sandstone  cliff  ;  and  in  front,  a  smooth 
platform,  strewn  with  beams  and  moldering  tools,  and  here  and 
there  a  skull  bleaching  among  the  sand,  perhaps  of  some  workman 
slaughtered  at  his  labor  in  one  of  the  thousand  wars  of  old.  The 
abbot,  his  spiritual  father, — indeed,  the  only  father  whom  he  knew, 
for  his  earliest  recollections  were  of  the  Laura  and  the  old  man’s 
cell, — ^liad  strictly  forbidden  him  to  enter,  even  to  approach,  any  of 
those  relics  of  ancient  idolatry  :  but  a  broad  terrace-road  led  down  to 
the  platform  from  the  table-land  above  ;  the  plentiful  supply  of  fuel 

was  too  tempting  to  be  passed  by . He  would  go  down,  gather  a 

few  sticks,  and  then  return,  to  tell  the  abbot  of  the  treasure  which 
he  had  found,  and  consult  him  as  to  the  propriety  of  revisiting  it. 

So  down  he  went,  hardly  daring  to  raise  his  eyes  to  the  alluring 
iniquities  of  the  painted  imagery  which,  gaudy  in  crimson  and  blue, 
still  blazed  out  upon  the  desolate  solitude,  uninjured  by  that  rainless 
air.  But  he  was  young,  and  youth  is  curious  ;  and  the  Devil,  at 
least  in  the  fifth  century,  busy  with  young  brains.  NowPhilammon 
believed  most  utterly  in  the  Devil,  and  night  and  day  devoutly 
prayed  to  be  delivered  from  him  ;  so  he  crossed  himself,  and  ejacu¬ 
lated,  honestly  enough,  “  Lord,  turn  away  mine  eyes,  lest  they  be¬ 
hold  vanity  !”.  . .  .and  looked  nevertheless . 

And  who  could  have  helped  looking  at  those  four  colossal  kings, 
who  sat  there  grim  and  motionless,  their  huge  hands  laid  upon  their 
knees  in  everlasting  self-assured  repose,  seeming  to  bear  up  the 
mountain  on  their  stately  head?  A  sense  of  awe,  weakness,  all  but 
fear,  came  over  him.  He  dare  not  stoop  to  take  up  the  wood  at  his 
feet,  their  great  stern  eyes  watched  him  so  steadily. 

Round  their  knees  and  round  their  thrones  were  mystic  characters 
engraven,  symbol  after  symbol,  line  below  line, — the  ancient  wisdom 
of  the  Egyptians,  wherein  Moses,  the  man  of  God,  was  learned  of 
old, — why  should  not  he  know  it  too  ?  What  awful  .secrets  might  not 
be  hidden  there  about  the  great  world,  past,  present  and  future,  of 
which  he  knew  only  so  small  a  speck  ?  Those  kings  who  sat  there, 
they  had  known  it  all  ;  their  sharp  lips  seemed  parting,  read}’’  to 
speak  to  him. .  .  .0  that  they  Avould  speak  for  once  !.  .  .  .and  yet  that 
grim,  sneering  smile,  that  seemed  to  look  down  on  him  from  the 
heights  of  their  power  and  wisdom  with  calm  contempt. . .  .him,  the 


THE  LAURA.  15 

poor  youth,  picking  up  the  leaving  and  rags  of  their  past  majesty. 

. . .  .He  dare  look  at  them  no  more. 

So  he  looked  past  them,  into  the  temple  halls  ;  into  a  lustrous  abyss 
of  cool,  green  shade,  deepening  on  and  inward,  pillar  after  pillar, 
vista  after  vista,  into  deepest  night.  And  dimly  through  the  gloom 
he  could  descry,  on  every  wall  and  column,  gorgeous  arabesques, 
long  lines  of  pictured  story  ;  triumphs  and  labors  ;  rows  of  captives 
in  foreign  and  fantastic  dresses,  leading  strange  animals,  bearing  the 
tributes  of  unknown  lands  ;  rows  of  ladies  at  feasts,  their  heads 
crowned  with  garlands,  the  fragrant  lotus-flower  in  every  hand,  while 
slaves  brought  wine  and  perfumes,  and  children  sat  upon  their  knees, 
and  husbands  by  their  side  ;  and  dancing-girls,  in  transparent  robes 
and  golden  girdles,  tossed  their  tawny  limbs  wildly  among  the  throng. 
. . .  .What  was  the  meaning  of  it  all?  Why  had  it  all  been?  Why 
had  it  gone  on  thus,  the  great  world,  century  after  century,  millen¬ 
nium  after  millennium,  eating  and  drinking,  and  marrying  and  giving 
in  marriage,  and  knowing  nothing  better.  .  .  .how  could  they  know 
anything  better  ?  Their  forefathers  had  lost  the  light  ages  and  ages 

before  they  were  born . And  Christ  had  not  come  for  ages  and  ages 

after  they  were  dead . How  could  they  know?....  And  yet  they 

wore  all  in  hell. ..  .every  one  of  them.  Every  one  of  these  ladies 
who  sat  there,  with  her  bushy  locks,  and  garlands,  and  jeweled 
collars,  and  lotus-flowers,  and  gauzy  dress,  displaying  all  her  slender 
limbs, — who,  perhaps,  when  she  was  alive,  smiled  so  sweetly,  and 
went  so  gayly,  and  had  children,  and  friends,  and  never  once  thought 

of  what  was  going  to  happen  to  her, — what  must  happen  toiler . 

She  was  in  hell . Burning  forever,  and  ever,  and  ever,  there  below 

his  feet.  He  stared  down  on  the  rocky  floors.  If  he  could  but  see 
through  them.  . .  .and  the  eye  of  faith  could  see  through  it.  .  .  .he 
should  behold  her  writhing  and  twisting  among  the  flickering  flame, 
scorcl'.od,  glowing.  .  .  .in  everlasting  agony,  such  as  the  thought  of 
enduring  for  a  moment  made  him  shudder.  He  had  burned  his  hands 

once,  when  a  palm-leaf  hut  caught  fire . He  recollected  what  that 

was  like . She  was  enduring  ten  thousand  times  more  than  that, 

forever . He  should  hear  her  shrieking  in  vain  for  a  drop  of  water 

to  cool  her  tongue . He  had  never  heard  a  human  being  shriek  but 

once. . .  .a  boy  bathing  on  the  opposite  Nile  bank,  whom  a  crocadile 
had  dragged  down.  . .  .and  that  scream,  faint  and  distant  as  it  came 
across  the  mighty  tide,  had  rung  intolerable  in  his  ears  for  days .... 
and  to  think  of  all  which  echoed  through  those  vaults  of  fire — for¬ 
ever  !  Was  the  thought  bearable  ? — was  it  possible  ?  Millions  upon 

millions  burning  forever  for  Adam’s  fall . Could  God  be  just  in 

that  ?  .  .  .  .  ^ 

It  was  the  temptation  of  a  fiend  I  He  had  entered  the  unhallowed 
precincts,  where  devils  still  lingered  about  their  ancient  shrines  ;  he 
had  let  his  eyes  devour  the  abominations  of  the  heathen,  and  given 
place  to  the  Devil.  He  would  flee  home  to  confess  it  all  to  his  father. 


16 


BTPATtA. 


He  would  punish  him  as  he  deserved,  pray  for  him,  forgive  him. 
And  yet  could  he  tell  him  all  ?  Could  he,  dare  he,  confess  to  him  the 
whole  truth — the  insatiable  craving  to  know  the  mysteries  of  learn¬ 
ing,  to  see  the  great  roaring  world  of  men,  which  had  been  growing 
up  in  him  slowly,  month  after  month,  till  now  it  had  assumed  this 
fearful  shape  ?  He  could  stay  no  longer  in  the  desert.  This  world 
which  sent  all  souls  to  hell — was  it  as  bad  as  monks  declared  it  was  ? 
It  must  be,  else  how  could  such  be  the  fruit  of  it  ?  But  it  was  too 
awful  a  thought  to  be  taken  on  trust.  No  ;  he  must  go  and  see. 

Filled  with  such  fearful  questionings,  half-inarticulate  and  vague, 
like  the  thoughts  of  a  child,  the  untutored  youth  went  wandering  on, 
till  he  reached  the  edge  of  the  cliff  below  which  lay  his  home. 

It  lay  pleasantly  enough,  that  lonely  Laura,  or  lane  of  rude  Cyclo¬ 
pean  cells,  under  the  perpetual  shadow  of  the  southern  wall  of  crags, 
amid  its  grove  of  ancient  date-trees.  A  branching  cavern  in  the  cliff 
supplied  the  purposes  of  a  chapel,  a  storehouse,  and  a  hospital ; 
while  on  the  sunny  slope  across  the  glen  lay  the  common  gardens  of 
the  brotherhood,  green  with  millet,  maize,  and  beans,  among  which 
a  tiny  streamlet,  husbanded  and  guided  with  the  most  thrifty  care, 
wandered  down  from  the  cliff  foot,  and  spread  perpetual  •  verdure 
over  the  little  plot  which  voluntary  and  fraternal  labor  had  painfully 
redeemed  from  the  inroads  of  the  all-devouring  sand.  For  that  gar¬ 
den,  like  everything  else  in  the  Laura,  except  each  brother’s  seven 
feet  of  stone  sleeping-hut,  was  the  common  property,  and  therefore 
the  common  care  and  joy  of  all.  For  the  common  good,  as  well  as 
for  his  own,  each  man  had  toiled  up  the  glen  with  his  palm- leaf 
basket  of  black  mud  from  the  river  Nile,  over  whose  broad  sheet  of 
silver  the  glen’s  mouth  yawned  abrupt.  For  the  common  good,  each 
man  had  swept  the  ledges  clear  of  sand,  and  sown  in  the  scanty  arti¬ 
ficial  soil,  the  harvest  of  which  all  were  to  share  alike.  To  buy 
clothes,  books,  and  chapel  furniture  for  the  common  necessities,  edu¬ 
cation,  and  worship,  each  man  sat,  day  after  day,  week  after  week, 
his  mind  full  of  high  and  heavenly  thoughts,  weaving  the  leaves  of 
their  little  palm-copse  into  baskets,  which  an  aged  monk  exchanged 
for  goods  with  the  more  prosperous  and  frequented  monasteries  of  the 
opposite  bank.  Thither  Philammon  rowed  the  old  man  over,  week 
by  week,  in  a  light  canoe  of  papyrus,  and  fished,  as  he  sat  waiting 
for  him,  for  the  common  meal.  A  simple,  happy,  gentle  life  was 
that  of  the  Laura,  all  portioned  out  by  rules  and  methods,  which 
were  held  hardly  less  sacred  than  those  of  the  Scriptures,  on  which 
they  were  supposed  (and  not  so  wrongly  either)  to  have  been  framed. 
Each  man  had  food  and  raiment,  shelter  on  earth,  friends  and  coun¬ 
selors,  living  trust  in  the  continual  care  of  Almighty  God  ;  and,  blaz¬ 
ing  before  his  eyes,  by  day  and  night,  the  hope  of  everlasting  glory 

beyond  all  poets’  dreams . And  what  more  would  man  have  had 

in  those  days  ?  Thither  they  had  fled  out  of  cities,  compared  with 
which  Paris  is  earnest  and  Gomorrha  chaste — out  of  a  rotten,  infer- 


THE  LAURA. 


17 


nal,  dying  world  of  tyrants  and  slaves,  hypocrites  and  wantons — to 
ponder  undisturbed  on  duty  and  on  judgment,  on  death  and  eternity, 
heaven  and  hell  ;  to  find  a  common  creed,  a  common  interest,  a  com¬ 


mon  hope,  common  duties,  pleasures,  and  sorrows . True,  they 

had  many  of  them  fled  from  the  post  where  God  had  placed  them, 
when  they  fled  from  man  into  the  Thebaid  waste . What  sort 


of  post  and  what  sort  of  an  age  they  were,  from  which  those  old 
monks  fled,  we  shall  see,  perhaps,  before  this  tale  is  told  out. 

“  Thou  art  late,  son,”  said  the  abbot,  steadfastly  working  away  at 
his  palm-basket,  as  Philammon  approached. 

“  Fuel  is  scarce,  and  I  was  forced  to  go  far.” 

“A  monk  should  not  answer  till  he  is  questioned.  I  did  not  ask 
the  reason.  Where  didst  thou  find  that  wood?” 

“  Before  the  temple,  far  up  the  glen.” 

‘  ‘  The  temple  !  What  didst  thou  see  there  ?  ” 

No  answer.  Pambo  looked  up  with  his  keen  black  eye. 

“  Thou  hast  entered  it,  and  lusted  after  its  abominations.” 

“  I — I  did  not  enter  ;  but  I  looked - ” 

And  what  didst  thou  see?  Women?  ” 

Philammon  was  silent. 

“  Have  I  not  bidden  you  never  to  look  on  the  face  of  women?  Are 
they  not  the  first-fruits  of  the  Devil,  the  authors  of  all  evil,  the  sub¬ 
tlest  of  all  Satan’s  snares  ?  Are  they  not  accursed  forever,  for  the 
deceit  of  their  first  mother,  by  whom  sin  entered  into  the  world  ? 
A  woman  first  opened  the  gates  of  hell ;  and,  until  this  day,  they 
are  the  portresses  thereof.  Unhappy  boy  !  what  hast  thou  done  ?  ” 

“  They  were  but  painted  on  the  walls.” 

“Ah  !”  said  the  abbot,  as  if  suddenly  relieved  from  a  heavy  bur¬ 
den.  “But  how  knewest  thou  them  to  be  women,  when  thou  hast 
'  never  yet,  unless  thou  liest — which  I  believe  not  of  thee — seen  the 
face  of  a  daughter  of  Eve  ?  ” 

“Perhaps — perhaps,”  said  Philammon,  as  if  suddenly  relieved  by 
a  new  suggestion — “  perhaps  they  were  only  devils.  They  must 
have  been,  I  think,  for  they  were  so  very  beautiful !  ” 

“  Ah  !  how  knowest  thou  that  devils  are  beautiful?  ” 

“I  was  launching  the  boat,  a  week  ago,  with  Father  Aufugus  ; 
and  on  the  bank  ....  not  very  near  ....  there  were  two  creatures 
....  with  long  hair,  and  striped  all  over  the  lower  half  of  their  bod¬ 
ies  with  black,  and  red,  and  yellow  ....  and  they  were  gathering 
flowers  on  the  shore.  Father  Aufugus  turned  away  ;  but  I  ....  I 
could  not  help  thinking  them  the  most  beautiful  things  that  I  had 
ever  seen  ....  so  I  asked  him  why  he  turned  away  ;  and  he  said 
that  those  were  the  same  sort  of  devils  which  tempted  the  blessed 
St.  Anthony.  Then  I  recollected  having  heard  it  read  aloud,  how 

Satan  tempted  Anthony  in  the  shape  of  a  beautiful  woman . 

And  so  ...  .  and  so  ...  .  those  figures  on  the  wall  were  very  like 
...  and  I  thought  they  might  be  ....  ” 


15 


HYPATIA. 


And  tlie  poor  boy,  who  considered  tliat  lie  was  making  confession 
of  a  deadly  and  sliameful  sin,  blushed  scarlet,  and  stammered,  and 
at  last  stopped. 

“  And  thou  though  test  them  beautiful?  O  utter  corruption  of  the 
flesh  !  O  subtlety  of  Satan  !  The  Lord  forgive  thee,  as  1  do,  my  poor 
child  :  henceforth  thou  goest  not  beyond  the  garden  walls.” 

“Not  beyond  the  walls  !  Impossible  !  I  cannot  !  If  thou  wert  not 
my  father,  I  would  say,  I  will  not  !  I  must  have  liberty  !  I  must  see 
for  mvself,  I  must  judge  for  myself,  what  this  world  is  of  which  you 
all  talk  so  bitterly.  I  long  for  no  pomps  and  vanities.  I  will  prom, 
ise  you  this  moment,  if  you  will,  never  to  re-enter  a  heathen  temple 
— to  hide  my  face  in  the  dust  whenever  I  approach  a  woman.  But  1 
must,  I  must  see  the  world  ;  I  must  see  the  great  mother  church  in 
Alexandria,  and  the  patriarch,  and  his  clergy.  If  they  can  serve 
God  in  the  city,  why  not  I  ?  I  could  do  more  for  God  there  than  here. 
.  ...  Not  that  I  despise  this  work,  not  that  I  am  ungrateful  to  you — 
O,  never,  never  that ! — but  I  pant  for  the  battle.  Let  me  go  !  I  am 
not  discontented  with  you,  but  with  myself.  1  know  that  obedience 
is  noble  ;  but  danger  is  nobler  still.  If  you  have  seen  the  world, 
why  should  not  I  ?  If  you  have  fled  from  it  because  you  found  it  too 
evil  to  live  in^  why  should  not  I,  and  return  to  you  here  of  my  own 
will,  never  to  leave  you  ?.-...  And  yet  Cyril  and  his  clergy  have  not 
fled  from  it . ” 

Desperately  and  breathlessly  did  Philammon  drive  this  speech  out 
of  his  inmost  heart  ;  and  then  waited,  expecting  the  good  abbot  to 
strike  him  on  the  spot.  If  he  had,  the  young  man  would  have  sub¬ 
mitted  patiently  ;  so  would  any  man,  however  venerable,  in  that 

monastery . Why  not?  Duly,  after  long  companionship,  thought, 

and  prayer,  they  had  elected  Pambo  for  their  abbot,  abba,  father,  the 
wisest,  eldest-hearted  and  headed  of  them  ;  if  he  was  that,  it  was 

time  that  he  should  be  obeyed . And  obeyed  he  was,  with  a 

loyal,  reasonable  love,  and  yet  with  an  implicit,  soldier-like  obe¬ 
dience,  which  many  a  king  and  conqueror  might  envy.  Were  they 
cowards  and  slaves  ?  The  Roman  legionaries  should  be  good  judges 

on  that  point . They  used  to  say  that  no  armed  barbarian,  Goth 

or  Vandal,  Moor  or  Spaniard,  was  so  terrible  as  the  unarmed  monk 
of  the  Thebaid. 

Twice  the  old  man  lifted  his  staff  to  strike  ;  twice  he  laid  it  down 
again  ;  and  then,  slowly  rising,  left  Philammon  kneeling  there,  and 
moved  away  deliberately,  and  with  eyes  fixed  on  the  ground,  to  the 
house  of  the  brother  Aufugus. 

Every  one  in  the  Laura  honored  Aufugus.  There  was  a  mystery 
about  him,  which  heightened  the  charm  of  his  surpassing  sanctity, 
his  childlike  sweetness  and  humility.  It  was  whispered — when  the 
monks  seldom  and  cautiously  did  whisper  together  in  their  lonely 
walks — that  he  had  been  once  a  great  man  ;  that  he  had  come  from 
a  great  city,  perhaps  from  Rome  itself.  And  the  simple  monks  were 


THE  LA  URA. 


19 


proud  to  think  that  they  had  among  them  a  man  who  had  seen  Rome. 
At  least,  Abbot  Pambo  respected  him.  He  was  never  beaten  ;  never 
even  reproved, — perhaps  he  never  required  it ;  but  still  it  was  the 
meed  of  all  ;  and  was  not  the  abbot  a  little  partial  ?  Yet,  certainly, 
when  Tlieophilus  sent  up  a  messenger  from  Alexandria,  rousing  every 
Laura  with  the  news  of  the  sack  of  Rome  by  Alaric,  did  not  Pambo 
take  him  first  to  the  cell  of  Aufugus,  and  sit  with  him  there  three 
whole  hours  in  secret  consultation,  before  he  told  the  awful  story  to 
the  rest  of  the  brotherhood  ?  And  did  not  Aufugus  himself  give  let¬ 
ters  to  the  messenger,  written  with  his  own  hand,  containing,  as  was 
said,  deep  secrets  of  worldly  policy,  known  only  to  himself?  So, 
when  the  little  lane  of  holy  men,  each  peering  stealthily  over  his 
plaiting- work  from  the  doorway  of  his  sandstone  cell,  saw  the  abbot, 
after  his  unwonted  passion,  leave  the  culprit  kneeling,  and  take  his 
way  toward  the  sage’s  dwelling,  they  judged  that  something  strange 
and  delicate  had  befallen  the  common  weal,  and  each  wished,  with¬ 
out  envy,  that  he  were  as  wise  as  the  man  whose  counsel  was  to  solve 
the  difficulty. 

For  an  hour  or  more  the  abbot  remained  there,  talking  earnestly 
and  low  ;  and  then  a  solemn  sound  as  of  the  two  o^d  men  praying 
with  sobs  and  tears  ;  and  every  brother  bowed  his  head,  and  whis¬ 
pered  a  hope  that  He  whom  they  served  might  guide  them  for  the 
good  of  the  Laura,  and  of  His  Church,  and  of  the  great  heathen 
world  beyond  ;  and  still  Philammon  knelt  motionless,  awaiting  his 
sentence  ;  his  heart  filled, — who  can  tell  how?  “  The  heart  knoweth 
its  own  bitterness,  and  a  stranger  intermeddleth  not  with  its  joy.” 
(So  thought  he  as  he  knelt ;  and  so  think  I,  too,  knowing  that  in  the 
pettiest  character  there  are  unfathomable  depths,  which  the  poet, 
all-seeing  though  he  may  pretend  to  be,  can  never  analyze,  but  must 
only  dimly  guess  at,  and  still  more  dimly  sketch  them  by  the  actions 
which  they  beget. 

At  last  Pambo  returned,  deliberate,  still,  and  slow,  as  he  had  gone, 
and,  seating  himself  within  his  cell,  spoke  : — 

‘  ‘  And  the  youngest  said.  Father,  give  me  the  portion  of  goods  that 

falleth  to  my  share . And  he  took  his  journey  into  a  far  country, 

and  there  wasted  his  substance  with  riotous  living.  Thou  shalt  go, 
my  son.  But  first  come  after  me,  and  speak  with  Aufugus.” 

Philammon,  like  everyone  else,  loved  Aufugus  ;  and  when  the  ab¬ 
bot  retired  and  left  the  two  alone  together,  he  felt  no  dread  or  shame 

about  unburdening  his  whole  heart  to  him . Long  and  passionately 

he  spoke,  in  answer  to  the  gentle  questions  of  the  old  man,  who, 
without  the  rigidity  or  pedantic  solemnity  of  the  monk,  interrupted 
the  youth,  and  let  himself  be  interrupted  in  return,  gracefully,  geni¬ 
ally,  almost  playfully.  And  yet  there  was  a  melancholy  about  his 
tone,  as  he  answered  to  the  youth’s  appeal : — 

“  Tertullian,  Origen,  Clement,  Cyprian, — all  these  moved  in  the 
world  ;  all  these,  and  many  more  beside,  whose  names  we  honor, 


20 


HYPATIA. 


wliose  prayers  we  invoke,  were  learned  in  tlie  wisdom  of  the  heathen, 
and  fought  and  labored,  unspotted,  in  the  world  ;  and  why  not  I  ? 
Cyril  the  patriarch,  himself,  was  he  not  called  from  the  caves  of 
N  itria  to  sit  on  the  throne  of  Alexandria  ?  ” 

Slowly  the  old  man  lifted  his  hand,  and,  putting  back  the  thick 
locks  of  the  kneeling  youth,  gazed,  with  soft,  pitying  eyes,  long  and 
earnestly  into  his  face. 

“  And  thou  wouldst  see  the  world,  poor  fool  ?  And  thou  wouldst 
see  the  world  ?  ” 

“  I  would  convert  the  world.” 

“  Thou  must  know  it,  first.  And  shall  I  tell  thee  what  that  world 
is  like,  which  seems  to  thee  so  easy  to  convert  ?  Here  I  sit,  the  poor, 
unknown  old  monk,  until  I  die,  fasting  and  praying,  if  perhaps  God 
will  have  mercy  on  my  soul :  but  little  thou  knowest  how  I  have 
seen  it.  Little  thou  knowest,  or  thou  wouldst  be  well  content  to  rest 

here  till  the  end.  I  was  Arsenius . Ah  !  vain  old  man  that  I 

am  !  Thou  hast  never  heard  that  name,  at  which  once  queens  would 
whisper  and  grow  pale.  Vanitas  vanitatum  !  omnia  vanitas  !  And 
yet  he,  at  wliose  frown  half  the  world  trembles,  has  trembled  himself 
at  mine.  I  was  the  tutor  of  Arcadius.” 

“  The  Emperor  of  Byzantium  ?  ” 

“  Even  so,  my  son,  even  so.  There  I  saw  the  world  which  thou 
wouldst  see.  And  what  saw  I  ?  E  .  en  what  thou  wilt  see.  Eunuchs 
the  tyrants  of  their  own  sovereigns.  Bishops  kissing  the  feet  of  par¬ 
ricides  and  harlots.  Saints  tearing  saints  in  pieces  for  a  word,  while 
sinners  cheer  them  on  to  the  unnatural  fight.  Liars  thanked  for 
lying,  hypocrites  rejoicing  in  their  hypocrisy.  The  many  sold  and 
butchered  for  the  malice,  the  caprice,  the  vanity,  of  the  few.  The 
plunderers  of  the  poor  plundered  in  their  turn  by  worse  devourers 
than  themselves.  Every  attempt  at  reform  the  parent  of  worse 
scandals  ;  every  mercy  begetting  fresh  cruelties  ;  every  persecutor 
silenced,  only  to  enable  others  to  persecute  him  in  their  turn  ;  every 
devil  who  is  exorcised  returning  with  seven  others  worse  than  him¬ 
self  ;  falsehood  and  selfishness,  spite  and  lust,  confusion  seven  times 
confounded,  Satan  casting  out  Satan  everywhere, — from  the  emperor 
who  wantons  on  his  throne,  to  the  slave  who  blasphemes  beneath  his 
fetters.” 

“If  Satan  cast  out  Satan,  his  kingdom  shall  not  stand.” 

“  In  the  world  to  come.  But  in  this  world  it  shall  stand  and  con¬ 
quer,  even  worse  and  worse,  until  the  end.  These  are  the  last  days 
spoken  of  by  the  prophets,  the  beginning  of  woes  such  as  never 
have  been  on  the  earth  before.  ‘  On  earth  distress  of  nations  with 
perplexity,  men’s  hearts  failing  them  for  fear,  and  for  the  dread  of 
those  things  which  are  coming  on  the  earth.’  I  have  seen  it  long. 
Year  after  year  I  have  watched  them  coming  nearer  and  ever  nearer 
in  their  course,  like  the  whirling  sand-storms  of  the  desert,  which 
sweep  past  the  caravan,  and  past  again,  and  yet  overwhelm  it  after 


THE  LAURA. 


21 


all, — tliat  black  flood  of  tlie  Nortliern  barbarians.  I  foretold  it ;  I 
prayed  against  it ;  but,  like  Cassandra’s  of  old,  my  prophecy  and  my 
prayers  were  alike  unheard.  My  pupils  spurned  my  warnings.  The 
lusts  of  youth,  the  intrigues  of  courtiers,  were  stronger  than  the 
warning  voice  of  God  ;  then  I  ceased  to  hope  ;  I  ceased  to  pray  for 
the  glorious  city,  for  I  knew  that  her  sentence  was  gone  forth  ;  I  saw 
her  in  the  spirit,  even  as  Saint  John  saw  her  in  the  Revelation  ;  her, 
and  her  sins,  and  her  ruin.  And  I  fled  secretly  at  night,  and  buried 
myself  here  in  the  desert,  to  await  the  end  of  the  world.  Night  and 
day  I  pray  the  Lord  to  accomplish  his  elect,  and  to  hasten  his  king¬ 
dom.  Morning  by  morning  I  look  up  trembling,  and  yet  in  hope,  for 
the  sign  of  the  Son  of  Man  in  heaven,  when  the  sun  shall  be  turned 
into  darkness,  and  the  moon  into  blo«,d,  and  the  stars  shall  fall  from 
heaven,  and  the  skies  pass  away  likt  a  scroll,  and  the  fountains  of 
the  nether  fire  burst  up  around  oui  feet,  an '  the  end  of  all  shall 
come.  And  thou  wouldst  go  into  the  vvoila  iiom  which  I  fled  ?  ” 

“  If  the  harvest  be  at  hand,  the  Lord  needs  laborers.  If  the  times 
be  awful,  I  should  be  doing  awful  things  in  them.  Send  me,  and 
let  that  day  find  me,  where  I  long  to  be,  in  the  forefront  of  the  bat¬ 
tle  of  the  Lord.” 

The  Lord’s  voice  be  obeyed  !  Thou  shalt  go.  Here  are  letters 
to  Cyril  the  patriarch.  He  will  love  thee  for  my  sake  :  and  for  thine 
own  sake,  too,  I  trust.  Thou  goest  of  our  free-will  as  well  as  thine 
own.  The  abbot  and  I  have  watched  thee  long,  knowing  that  the 
Lord  had  need  of  such  as  thee  elsewhere.  We  did  but  prove  thee, 
to  see,  by  thy  readiness  to  obey,  whether  thou  wert  fit  to  rule.  Go, 
and  God  be  with  thee.  Covet  no  man’s  gold  or  silver.  Neither  eat 
flesh  nor  drink  wine,  but  live  as  thou  hast  lived, — a  Nazarite  of  the 
Lord.  Fear  not  the  face  of  man  ;  but  look  not  on  the  face  of  woman. 
In  an  evil  hour  came  they  into  the  world,  the  mothers  of  all  mischiefs 
which  I  have  seen  under  the  sun.  Come  ;  the  abbot  waits  for  v?  at 
the  gate.  ” 

With  tears  of  surprise,  joy,  sorrow,  almost  of  dread,  Philammon 
hung  back. 

“Nay,  come.  Why  shouldst  thou  break  thy  brethren’s  hearts 
and  ours  by  many  leave-takings  ?  Bring  from  the  storehouse  a  week’s 
provision  of  dried  dates  and  millet.  The  papyrus  boat  lies  at  the 
ferry  ;  thou  shalt  descend  in  it.  The  Lord  will  replace  it  for  us  when 
we  need  it.  Speak  with  no  man  on  the  river,  except  the  monks  of 
God.  When  thou  hast  gone  five  days’  journey  downward,  ask  for 
the  mouth  of  the  canal  of  Alexandria.  Once  in  the  city  any  monk 
will  guide  thee  to  the  archbishop.  Send  us  news  of  thy  welfare  by 
some  holy  mouth.  Come.” 

Silently  they  paced  together  down  the  glen  to  the  lonely  beach  of 
the  great  stream.  Pambo  was  there  already,  his  white  hair  glitter¬ 
ing  in  the  rising  moon,  as  with  slow  and  feeble  arms  he  launched 
the  light  canoe,  Philammon  flung  himself  at  the  old  men’s  feet, 


22 


HYP  AHA. 


and  besouglit,  with  many  tears,  their  forgiveness  and  their  blessing. 

“We  have  nothing  to  forgive.  Follow  thou  thine  inward  call.  If 
it  be  of  the  flesh,  it  will  avenge  itself  ;  if  it  be  of  the  Spirit,  who  are 
we  that  we  should  fight  against  God  ?  Farewell !  ” 

A  few  minutes  more,  and  the  youth  and  his  canoe  were  lessening 
down  the  rapid  stream  in  the  golden  summer  twilight.  Again  a 
minute,  and  the  swift  southern  night  had  fallen,  and  all  was  dark, 
but  the  cold  glare  of  the  moon  on  the  river,  and  on  the  rock-faces, 
and  on  the  two  old  men,  as  they  knelt  upon  the  beach,  and  with  their 
heads  upon  each  other’s  shoulders,  like  two  children,  sobbed  and 
prayed  together  for  the  lost  darling  of  their 


CHAPTER  iL 


H 


THE  DYING  WORLD. 

In  the  vipper  story  of  a  house  in  the  Museum  street  of  Alexandria, 
built  and  fitted  up  on  the  old  Athenian  mode],  was  a  small  room.  It 
had  been  chosen  by  its  occupant,  not  merely  on  account  of  its  quiet ; 
for  though  it  was  tolerably  out  of  hearing  of  the  female  slaves  who 
worked,  and  chattered,  and  quarreled  under  the  cloisters  oi  the 
women’s  court  on  the  south  side,  yet  it  was  exposed  to  the  rattle  of 
carriages  and  the  voices  of  passengers  in  the  fashionable  street  below, 
and  to  strange  bursts  of  roaring,  squealing,  and  trumpeting  from  the 
Menagerie,  a  short  way  otf,  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  street.  The 
attraction  of  the  situation  lay,  perhaps,  in  the  view  which  it  commanded 
over  the  wall  of  the  Museum  gardens,  of  flower-beds,  shrubberies, 
fountains,  statues,  walks,  and  alcoves,  which  had  echoed  for  nearly 
seven  hundred  years  to  the  wisdom  of  the  Alexandrine  sages  and 
poets.  School  after  school,  they  had  all  walked,  and  taught,  and 
sung  there,  beneath  the  spreading  planes  and  chestnuts,  figs  and  palm- 
trees.  The  place  seemed  fragrant  with  all  the  riches  of  Greek  thought 
and  song,  since  the  days  when  Ptolemy  Philadelphus  walked  there 
with  Euclid  and  Theocritus,  Callimachus  and  Lycophron. 

On  the  left  of  the  garden  stretched  the  lofty  eastern  front  of  the 
Museum  itself,  with  its  picture-galleries,  halls  of  statuary,  dining- 
halls,  and  lecture-rooms  ;  one  huge  wing  containing  that  famous 
library,  founded  by  the  father  of  Philadelphus,  which  held  in  the 
time  of  Seneca,  even  after  the  destruction  of  a  great  part  of  it  in 
Caesar’s  siege,  four  hundred  thousand  manuscripts.  There  it  towered 
up,  the  wonder  of  the  world,  its  white  roof  bright  against  the  rain¬ 
less  blue  ;  and  beyond  it,  among  the  ridges  and  pediments  of  noble 
buildings,  a  broad  glimpse  of  the  bright  blue  sea. 

The  room  was  fitted  up  in  the  purest  Greek  style,  not  without  an 
affectation  of  archaism,  in  the  severe  forms  and  subdued  half-tints  of 
the  frescoes  which  ornamented  the  walls  with  scenes  from  the  old 
myths  of  Athene.  Yet  the  general  effect,  even  under  the  blazing  sun 
which  poured  in  through  the  mosquito-nets  of  the  court-yard  win¬ 
dows,  was  one  of  exquisite  coolness,  and  cleanliness,  and  repose. 
The  room  had  neither  carpet  nor  fireplace  ;  and  the  only  movables  in 
it  were  a  sofa-bed,  a  table,  and  an  arm-chair,  all  of  such  delicate  and 
graceful  forms,  as  may  be  seen  on  ancient  vases  of  a  far  earlier  period 
than  that  whereof  we  write.  But,  most  probably,  had  any  of  us  entered 


24 


HYPATIA. 


that  room  that  morning,  we  should  not  have  been  able  to  spare  a  look 
either  for  the  furniture,  or  the  general  effect,  or  the  Museum  gardens, 
or  the  sparkling  Mediterranean  beyond  ;  but  we  should  have  agreed 
that  the  room  was  quite  rich  enough  for  human  eyes,  for  the  sake  of 
one  treasure  which  it  possessed,  and,  beside  which,  nothing  was  worth 
a  moment’s  glance.  For  in  the  light  arm-chair,  reading  a  manuscript 
which  lay  on  the  table,  sat  a  woman,  of  some  five-and-twenty  years, 
evidently  the  tutelary  goddess  of  that  little  shrine,  dressed,  in  per¬ 
fect  keeping  with  the  archaism  of  the  chamber,  in  a  simple  old  snow- 
white  Ionic  robe,  falling  to  the  feet,  and  reaching  to  the  throat,  and 
of  that  peculiarly  severe  and  graceful  fashion  in  which  the  upper 
part  of  the  dress  falls  downward  again  from  the  neck  to  the  waist  in 
a  sort  of  cape,  entirely  hiding  the  outline  of  the  bust,  while  it  leaves 
the  arms  and  the  point  of  the  shoulders  bare.  Her  dress  was  entirely 
without  ornament,  except  the  two  narrow  purple  stripes  down  the 
front,  which  marked  her  rank  as  a  Roman  citizen,  the  gold-embroid¬ 
ered  shoes  upon  her  feet,  and  the  gold  net,  which  looped  back  from 
her  forehead  to  her  neck,  hair  the  color  and  gloss  of  which  were  hardly 
distinguishable  from  that  of  the  metal  itself,  such  as  Athene  herself 
might  have  envied  for  tint,  and  mass,  and  ripple.  Her  features, 
arms,  and  hands  were  of  the  severest  and  grandest  type  of  old  Greek 
beauty,  at  once  showing  everywhere  the  high  development  of  the 
bones,  and  covering  them  with  that  firm,  round,  ripe  outline,  and 
waxy  morbidezza  of  skin,  which  the  old  Greeks  owed  to  their  con¬ 
tinual  use,  not  only  of  the  bath  and  muscular  exercise,  but  also  of 
daily  unguents.  There  might  have  seemed  to  us  too  much  sadness 
in  that  clear  gray  eye  ;  too  much  self-conscious  restraint  in  those 
sharp  curved  lips  ;  too  much  affectation  in  the  studied  severity  of  her 
posture  as  she  read,  copied,  as  it  seemed,  from  some  old  vase  or  bass- 
relief.  But  the  glorious  grace  and  beauty  of  every  line  of  face  and 
figure  would  have  excused,  even  hidden,  those  defects,  and  we  should 
have  only  recognized  the  marked  resemblance  to  the  ideal  portraits  of 
Athene,  which  adorned  every  panel  of  the  walls. 

She  has  lifted  her  eyes  off  her  manuscript  ;  she  is  looking  out  with 
kindling  countenance  over  the  gardens  of  the  Museum^  her  ripe, 
curling  Greek  lips,  such  as  we  never  see  now,  even  among  our  own 
wives  and  sisters,  open.  She  is  talking  to  herself.  Listen  ! 

“Yes.  The  statues  there  are  broken.  The  libraries  are  plun¬ 
dered.  The  alcoves  are  silent.  The  oracles  are  dumb.  And  yet, 
who  says  that  the  old  faith  of  heroes  and  sages  is  dead  ?  The  beauti¬ 
ful  can  never  die.  If  the  gods  have  deserted  their  oracles,  they  have 
not  deserted  the  souls  who  aspire  to  them.  If  they  have  ceased  to 
guide  nations,  they  have  not  ceased  to  speak  to  their  own  elect.  If 
they  have  cast  off  the  vulgar  herd,  they  have  not  cast  off  Hypatia. 

•  ••  ••••• 

“  Ay.  To  believe  in  the  old  creeds,  while  everyone  else  is  drop¬ 
ping  away  from  them. . .  .To  believe  in  spite  of  disappointments. . .  .To 


TSw  dtmg  Would. 


hope  against  hope . To  show  one’s  self  superior  to  the  herd,  by  see¬ 

ing  boundless  depths  of  living  glory  in  myths  which  have  become 

dark  and  dead  to  them . To  struggle  to  the  last  against  the  new 

and  vulgar  superstitions  of  a  rotting  age,  for  the  faith  of  my  fore¬ 
fathers,  for  the  old  gods,  the  old  heroes,  the  old  sages  who  gauged 
the  mysteries  of  heaven  and  earth — and  perhaps  to  conquer — at  least 
to  have  my  reward  !  To  be  welcomed  into  the  celestial  ranks  of  the 
heroic — ^to  rise  to  the  immortal  gods,  to  the  ineffable  powers,  onward, 
upward  ever,  through  ages  and  through  eternities ,  till  I  find  my  home 
at  last,  and  vanish  in  the  glory  of  the  Nameless  and  the  absolute 
One 

And  her  whole  face  flashed  out  into  wild  glory,  and  then  sank 
again  suddenly  into  a  shudder  of  something  like  fear  and  disgust,  as 
she  saw,  watching  her  from  under  the  wall  of  the  gardens  opposite, 
a  crooked,  withered  Jewish  crone,  dressed  out  in  the  most  gorgeous 
and  fantastic  style  of  barbaric  finery. 

“  Why  does  that  old  hag  haunt  me  ?  I  see  her  everywhere — till 
the  last  month  at  least — and  here  she  is  again  !  I  will  ask  the  pre¬ 
fect  to  find  out  who  she  is,  and  get  rid  of  her,  before  she  fascinates 
me  with  that  evil  eye.  Thank  the  gods,  there  she  moves  away  ! 
Foolish  ! — foolish  of-  me,  a  philosopher.  I  to  believe,  against  the 
authority  of  Porphyry  himself,  too,  in  evil  eyes  and  magic  !  But 
there  is  my  father,  pacing  up  and  down  in  the  library.” 

As  she  spoke,  the  old  man  entered  from  the  next  room.  He  was  a 
Greek  also,  but  of  a  more  common,  and  perhaps  lower  type  ;  dark 
and  fiery,  thin  and  graceful  ;  his  delicate  figure  and  cheeks,  wasted 
by  meditation,  harmonized  well  with  the  staid  and  simple  philosophic 
cloak  which  he  wore  as  a  sign  of  his  profession.  He  paced  impa¬ 
tiently  up  and  down  the  chamber,  while  his  keen,  glittering  eyes  and 
restless  gestures  betokened  intense  inward  thought . 

....“I  have  it . No;  again  it  escapes — it  contradicts  itself. 

Miserable  man  that  I  am  !  If  there  is  faith  in  Pythagoras,  the  sym¬ 
bol  should  be  an  expanding  series  of  the  powers  of  three  ;  and  yet 
that  accursed  binary  factor  will  introduce  himself.  Did  not  you  work 
the  sum  out  once,  Hypatia  ?  ” 

“  Sit  down,  my  dear  father,  and  eat.  You  have  tasted  no  food  yet 
this  day.” 

“  What  do  I  care  for  food  1  The  inexpressible  must  be  expressed. 
The  work  must  be  done,  if  it  cost  me  the  squaring  of  the  circle. 
How  can  he,  whose  sphere  lies  above  the  stars,  stoop  every  moment 
to  earth  ?  ” 

Ay,”  she  answered,  half  bitterly,  “and  would  that  we  could  live 
without  food,  and  imitate  perfectly  the  immortal  gods  !  But  while 
we  are  in  this  prison-house  of  matter,  we  must  wear  our  chain  ;  even 
wear  it  gracefully,  if  we  have  the  good  taste  ;  and  make  the  base 
necessities  of  this  body  of  shame  symbolic  of  the  diviner  food  of  the 
reason.  There  is  fruit,  with  lentils  and  rice,  waiting  for  you  in  the 
next  room  ;  and  bread,  unless  you  despise  it  too  much.” 


HTPATIA. 


“  The  foo{^  of  slaves  !  ”  he  answered.  “  Well,  I  will  eat,  and  he 
ashamed  of  eating.  Stay,  did  I  tell  you?  Six  new  pupils  in  the 
mathematical  school  this  morning.  It  grows  !  It  spreads  !  We  shall 
conquer  yet !  ” 

She  sighed.  How  do  you  know  that  they  have  not  come  to  you, 
as  Critias  and  Alcibiades  did  to  Socrates,  to  learn  a  merely  political 
and  mundane  virtue  ?  Strange  !  that  men  should  be  content  to  grovel, 
and  be  men,  when  they  might  rise  to  the  rank  of  gods  !  Ah,  my 
father  !  that  is  my  bitterest  grief  ;  to  see  those,  who  have  been  pre¬ 
tending  in  the  morning  lecture- room  to  worship  every  word  of  mine 
as  an  oracle,  lounging  in  the  afternoon  round  Pelagia’s  litter  ;  and 
■*^hen  at  night — for  I  know  they  do  it — the  dice,  and  the  wine,  and 
worse.  That  Pallas  herself  should  be  conquered  every  day  by  Venns 
Pandemos  !  That  Pelagia  should  have  more  power  than  I  !  Not 
that  such  a  creature  as  that  disturbs  me  :  no  created  thing,  I  hope, 
can  move  my  equanimity  ;  but  if  I  could  stoop  to  hate,  I  should  hate 
her — hate  her.” 

And  her  voice  took  a  tone  which  made  it  somewhat  uncertain 
whether,  in  spite  of  all  the  lofty  impassibility  which  she  felt  bound 
to  possess,  she  did  not  hate  Pelagia  with  a  most  human  and  mundane 
hatred. 

But  at  that  moment  the  conversation  was  cut  short  by  the  hasty 
entrance  of  a  slave-girl,  who,  with  flattering  voice,  announced, — 

“  His  excellency,  madam,  the  prefect  !  His  chariot  has  been  at 
the  gate  for  these  five  minutes,  and  he  is  now  coming  upstairs.” 

“Foolish  child  !”  answered  Hypatia,  with  some  affectation  of  in¬ 
difference.  “  And  why  should  that  disturb  me  ?  Let  him  enter.” 

The  door  opened,  and  in  came,  preceded  by  the  scent  of  half  a 
dozen  different  perfumes,  a  florid,  delicate-featured  man,  gorgeously 
dressed  out  in  senatorial  costume,  his  Angers  and  neck  covered  with 
jewels. 

“  The  representative  of  the  Caesars  honors  himself  by  offering  at 
the  shrine  of  Athene  Polias,  and  rejoices  to  see  in  her  priestess  as 

lovely  a  likeness  as  ever  of  the  goddess  whom  she  serves . Don’t 

betray  me,  but  I  really  cannot  help  talking  sheer  paganism  whenever 
I  find  myself  within  the  influence  of  your  eyes.” 

“  Truth  is  mighty,”  said  Hypatia,  as  she  rose  to  greet  him  with  a 
smile  and  a  reverence. 

“Ah,  so  they  say  ! — Your  excellent  father  has  vanished.  He  is 
really  too  modest — honest,  though — about  his  incapacity  for  state 
secrets.  After  all,  you  know  it  was  your  Minervaship  which  I  came 
to  consult.  How  has  this  turbulent  Alexandrian  rascaldom  been  be¬ 
having  itself  in  my  absence  ?” 

“  The  herd  has  been  eating,  and  drinking,  and  marrying,  as  usual, 
I  believe,”  answered  Hypatia  in  a  languid  tone. 

“  And  multiplying,  I  don’t  doubt.  Well,  there  will  be  less  loss  to 
the  empire  if  I  have  to  crucify  a  dozen  or  two,  as  I  positively  will, 


TS:E  DTim  WOTILI). 


tlie  next  riot.  It  is  really  a  great  comfort  to  a  statesman,  that  tlio 
masses  are  so  well  aware  that  they  deserve  hanging,  and  therefore  so 
careful  to  prevent  any  danger  of  public  justice  depopulating  the 
province.  But  how  go  on  the  schools  ?” 

Hypatia  shook  her  head  sadly. 

“  Ah,  boys  will  be  boys . I  plead  guilty  myself.  Videx  meliora 

proboque,  deteriora  sequor.  You  must  not  be  hard  on  us . Wheth¬ 

er  we  obey  you  or  not  in  private  life,  we  do  in  public  ;  and  if  we 
inthrone  you  queen  of  Alexandria,  you  must  allow  your  courtiers  and 
body-guards  a  few  court  licenses.  Now  don’t  sigh,  or  I  shall  be  in¬ 
consolable.  At  all  events,  your  worst  rival  has  betaken  herself  to 
the  wilderness,  and  gone  to  look  for  the  city  of  the  gods  above  the 
cataracts.” 

‘‘ Whom  do  you  mean  ?”  asked  Hypatia,  in  a  tone  most  unphilo- 
sophically  eager. 

“  Pelagia,  of  course.  I  met  that  prettiest  and  naughtiest  of  hu¬ 
manities  half-way  between  here  and  Thebes,  transformed  into  a  per¬ 
fect  Andromache  of  chaste  affection.” 

“  And  to  whom,  pray  ?” 

“  To  a  certain  Gothic  giant.  What  men  those  barbarians  do  breed  ! 
I  was  afraid  of  being  crushed  under  the  elephant’s  foot  at  every  step 
1  took  with  him  !” 

“  What !”  asked  Hypatia,  “  did  your  excellency  condescend  to  con¬ 
verse  with  such  savages  ?” 

“  To  tell  you  the  truth,  he  had  some  forty  stout  countrymen  of  his 
with  him,  who  might  have  been  troublesome  to  a  perplexed  prefect  ; 
not  to  mention  that  it  is  always  as  well  to  keep  on  good  terms  with 
these  Goths.  Really,  after  the  sack  of  Rome,  and  Athens  cleaned 
out  like  a  bee-hive  by  wasps,  things  begin  to  look  serious.  And  as 
for  the  great  brute  himself,  he  has  rank  enough,  in  his  way, — boasts 
of  his  descent  from  some  cannibal  god  or  other, — really  hardly  deigned 
to  speak  to  a  paltry  Roman  governor,  till  his  faithful  and  adoring 
bride  interceded  for  me.  Still,  the  fellow  understood  good  living, 
and  we  celebrated  our  new  treaty  of  friendship  with  noble  liba¬ 
tions  ; — but  I  must  not  talk  about  that  to  you.  However,  I  got  rid 
of  them  ;  quoted  all  the  geographical  lies  I  had  ever  heard,  and  a 
great  many  more  ;  quickened  their  appetite  for  their  fool’s  errand 
notably,  and  started  them  off  again.  So  now  the  star  of  Venus  is 
set,  and  that  of  Pallas  in  the  ascendant.  Wherefore  tell  me,  what 
am  I  to  do  with  Saint  Firebrand  ?” 

“  Cyril  ?” 

“  Cyril.” 

“  Justice.” 

“  Ah,  fairest  Wisdom,  don’t  mention  that  horrid  word  out  of  the 
lecture-room.  In  theory  it  is  all  very  well  ;  but  in  poor,  imperfect 
earthly  practice,  a  governor  must  be  content  with  doing  very  much 
what  comes  to  hand.  In  abstract  justice,  now,  I  ought  to  nail  up 


HTPAflA. 


Cyril,  deacons,  district  visitors,  and  all,  in  a  row,  on  tlie  sand-hills 
outside.  That  is  simple  enough  ;  but,  like  a  great  many  simple  and 
excellent  things,  impossible.” 

“You  fear  the  people ? ” 

“  Well,  my  dear  lady,  and  has  not  the  villainous  demagogue  got 
the  whole  mob  on  his  side  ?  Am  I  to  have  the  Constantinople  riots 
re-enacted  here  ?  I  really  cannot  face  it ;  I  have  not  nerve  for  it ; 
perhaps  I  am  too  lazy.  Be  it  so.  ” 

Hypatia  sighed.  “Ah,  that  your  excellency  but  saw  the  great 
duel,  which  depends  on  you  alone  !  Do  not  fancy  that  the  battle  is 

merely  between  Paganism  and  Christianity - ” 

“Why,  if  it  were,  you  know,  I,  as  a  Christian,  under  a  Christian 

and  sainted  emperor,  not  to  mention  his  august  sister - ” 

“  We  understand,”  interrupted  she,  with  an  impatient  wave  of  her 
beautiful  hand.  “Not  even  between  them  ;  not  even  between  phil¬ 
osophy  and  barbarianism.  The  struggle  is  simply  one  between  the 
aristocracy  and  the  mob, — between  wealth,  refinement,  art,  learning, 
all  that  makes  a  natipn  great,  and  the  savage  herd  of  child- breeders 
below,  the  many  ignoble,  who  were  meant  to  labor  for  the  noble  few. 
Shall  the  Roman  empire  command  or  obey  her  own  slaves  ?  is  the 
question  which  you  and  Cyril  have  to  battle  out  ;  and  the  fight  must 
be  internecine.” 

“  I  should  not  wonder  if  it  became  so,  really,”  answered  the  pre¬ 
fect,  with  a  shrug  of  his  shoulders.  “I  expect,  every  time  I  ride,  to 
have  my  brains  knocked  out  by  some  mad  monk.” 

“  Why  not,  in  an  age  when,  as  has  been  well  and  often  said, 
emperors  and  consul ars  crawl  to  the  tombs  of  a  tent-maker  and  a 
fisherman,  and  kiss  the  moldy  bones  of  the  vilest  slaves?  Why  not, 
among  a  people  whose  God  is  the  crucified  son  of  a  carpenter  ?  Why 
should  learning,  authority,  antiquity,  birth,  rank,  the  system  of  em¬ 
pire  which  has  been  growing  up,  fed  by  the  accumulated  wisdom  of 
ages, — why,  I  say,  should  any  of  these  things  protect  your  life  a 
moment  from  the  fury  of  any  beggar  who  believes  that  the  Son  of 
God  died  for  him  as  much  as  for  you,  and  that  he  is  your  equal,  if 
not  your  superior,  in  the  sight  of  his  low-born  and  illiterate  deity?”* 
“  My  most  eloquent  philosopher,  this  may  be — and  perhaps  is — all 
very  true,  I  quite  agree  that  there  are  very  great  practical  incon¬ 
veniences  of  this  kind  in  the  new — I  mean,  the  Catholic  faith  ;  but  the 
world  is  full  of  inconveniences.  The  wise  man  does  not  quarrel  with 
his  creed  for  being  disagreeable,  any  more  than  he  does  with  his 
finger  for  aching  ;  he  cannot  help  it,  and  must  make  the  best  of  a  bad 
matter.  Only  tell  me  how  to  keep  the  peace.” 

“  And  let  philosophy  be  destroyed  ?  ” 

“  That  it  never  will  be,  as  long  as  Hypatia  lives  to  illuminate  the 


*  These  are  the  arguments  and  the  language  which  were  commonly  employed  by 
Porphyry,  Julian,  and  the  other  opponents  of  Christianity. 


THE  HYINa  TYORLD. 


29 


eartli  ;  and,  as  far  as  I  am  concerned,  I  promise  you  a  clear  stage  and 
— a  great  deal  of  favor  ;  as  is  proved  by  my  visiting  you  publicly  at 
this  moment,  before  I  have  given  audience  to  one  of  the  four  hundred 
bores,  great  and  small,  who  are  waiting  in  the  tribunal  to  torment  me. 
Do  help  me  and  advise  me.  What  am  I  to  do  ?  ” 

“  I  have  told  you.” 

Ah,  yes,  as  to  general  principles.  But  out  of  the  lecture-room  I 
prefer  a  practical  expedient  :  for  instance,  Cyril  writes  to  me  here — 
plague  on  him  !  he  would  not  let  me  even  have  a  week’s  hunting  in 
peace — that  there  is  a  plot  on  the  part  of  the  Jews  to  murder  all  the 
Christians.  Here  is  the  precious  document, — do  look  at  it,  in  pity. 
For  aught  I  know  or  care,  the  plot  may  be  an  exactly  opposite  one, 
and  the  Christians  intend  to  murder  all  the  Jews.  But  I  must  take 
some  notice  of  the  letter.” 

“  I  do  not  see  that,  your  excellency.” 

“  Why,  if  anything  did  happen,  after  all,  conceive  the  missives 
which  would  be  sent  flying  off  to  Constantinople  against  me  !” 

“  Let  them  go.  If  you  are  secure  in  the  consciousness  of  innocence, 
what  matter  ?  ” 

“  Consciousness  of  innocence  !  I  shall  lose  my  prefecture!” 

“Your  danger  would  be  just  as  great  if  you  took  notice  of  it. 
Whatever  happened,  you  would  be  accused  of  favoring  the  Jews.” 

“  And  really  there  might  be  some  truth  in  the  accusation.  How 
the  finances  of  the  province  would  go  on  without  their  kind  assist¬ 
ance,  I  dare  not  think.  If  those  Christians  would  but  lend  me  their 
money,  instead  of  building  almshouses  and  hospitals  with  it,  they 
might  burn  the  Jews’  quarter  to-morrow  for  aught  I  care.  But 
now .  . . .” 

“  But  now,  you  must  absolutely  take  no  notice  of  this  letter.  The 
very  tone  of  it  forbids  you,  for  your  own  honor,  and  the  honor  of  the 
empire.  Are  you  to  treat  with  a  man  who  talks  of  the  masses  of 
Alexandria  as  the  ‘  flock  whom  the  King  of  kings  has  committed  to 
his  rule  and  care  ?’  Does  your  excellency,  or  this  proud  bishop,  gov¬ 
ern  Alexandria?” 

“  Really,  my  dear  lady,  I  have  given  up  inquiring.” 

“  But  he  has  not.  He  comes  to  you  as  a  person  possessing  an  abso¬ 
lute  authority  over  two-thirds  of  the  population,  which  he  does  not 
scruple  to  hint  to  you  is  derived  from  a  higher  source  than  your  own. 
The  consequence  is  clear.  If  it  be  from  a  higher  source  than  yours, 
of  course  it  ought  to  control  yours  ;  and  you  will  confess  that  it 
ought  to  control  it,  you  will  acknowledge  the  root  and  ground  of 
every  extravagant  claim  which  Jie  makes,  if  you  deign  to  reply.” 

“  But  I  must  say  something,  or  I  shall  be  pelted  in  the  streets. 
You  philosophers,  however  raised  above  your  own  bodies  you  may 
be,  must  really  not  forget  that  we  poor  worldlings  have  bones  to  be 
broken.” 

“  Then  tell  him,  and  by  word  of  mouth  merely,  that  as  the  informa- 


BO 


HYPATIA. 


tion  wLicli  he  sends  you  comes  from  his  private  knowledge,  and  com 
cerns  not  him  as  bishop,  but  you  as  magistrate,  you  can  only  take  it 
into  consideration  when  he  addresses  you  as  a  private  person,  laying 
a  regular  information  at  your  tribunal.” 

“  Charming  !  queen  of  diplomatists  as  well  as  philosophers  !  I  go 
to  obey  you.  Ah  !  why  were  you  not  Pulcheria?  No,  for  then  Alex¬ 
andria  had  been  dark,  and  Orestes  missed  the  supreme  happiness  of 
kissing  a  hand  which  Pallas,  when  she  made  you,  must  have  bor¬ 
rowed  from  the  workshop  of  Aphrodite.” 

“  Recollect  that  you  are  a  Christian,”  answered  Hypatia,  half 
smiling. 

So  the  prefect  departed  ;  and,  passing  through  the  outer  hall,  which 
was  already  crowded  with  Hypatia’s  aristocratic  pupils  and  visitors, 
bowed  his  way  out  past  them,  and  regained  his  chariot,  chuckling 
over  the  rebuff  which  he  intended  to  administer  to  Cyril,  and  com¬ 
forting  himself  with  the  only  text  of  Scripture  of  the  inspiration  of 
which  he  was  thoroughly  convinced, — “  Sufficient  for  the  day  is  the 
evil  thereof.” 

At  the  door  was  a  crowd  of  chariots,  slaves  vvith  their  masters’ 
parasols,  and  the  rabble  of  on-looking  boys  and  market-folk,  as  usual 
in  Alexandria  then,  as  in  all  great  cities  since,  who  were  staring  at 
the  prefect,  and  having  tlieir  heads  rapped  by  his  guards,  and  won¬ 
dering  what  sort  of  glorious  personage  Hypatia  might  be,  and  what 
sort  of  glorious  house  she  must  live  in,  to  be  fit  company  for  the 
great  governor  of  Alexandria.  Not  that  there  was  not  many  a  sulky 
and  lowering  face  among  the  mob,  for  the  great  majority  of  them 
were  Christians,  and  very  seditious  and  turbulent  politicians,  as 
Alexandrians,  “  men  of  Macedonia,”  were  bound  to  be;  and  there 
was  many  a  grumble  among  them,  all  but  audible,  at  the  prefect’s 
going  in  state  to  the  heathen  woman’s  house — heathen  sorceress, 
some  pious  old  woman  called  her — before  he  heard  any  poor  soul’s 
petition  in  the  tribunal,  or  even  said  his  prayers  in  church. 

Just  as  he  was  stepping  into  his  curricle,  a  tall  young  man,  as  gor¬ 
geously  bedizened  as  himself,  lounged  down  the  steps  after  him,  and 
beckoned  lazily  to  the  black  boy  who  carried  his  parasol. 

“Ah,  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  !  my  excellent  friend,  what  propitious 
deity — ahem  !  martyr — brings  you  to  Alexandria  just  as  I  want  you  ! 
Get  up  by  my  side,  and  let  us  have  a  chat  on  our  way  to  the  tribunal.” 

The  man  addressed  came  slowly  forward  with  an  ostentatiously 
low  salutation,  which  could  not  hide,  and  indeed  was  not  intended  to 
hide,  the  contemptuous  and  lazy  expression  of  his  face  ;  and  asked, 
in  a  drawling  tone, — 

“And  for  what  Idnd  purpose  does  the  representative  of  the  Caesars 
bestow  such  an  honor  on  the  humblest  of  his,  etc,,  etc. — your  pene¬ 
tration  will  supply  the  rest,” 

“  Don’t  be  frightened  ;  I  am  not  going  to  borrow  money  of  you/' 
answered  Orestes,  laughingly,  as  the  Jew  got  into  the  curricle. 


THE  DYING  WORLD. 


31 


‘  I  am  glad  to  hear  it.  Eeally,  one  usurer  in  a  family  is  enough. 
My  father  made  the  gold,  and  if  I  spend  it,  I  consider  that  I  do  all 
that  is  required  of  a  philosopher.” 

“A  charming  team  of  white  Nisaeans,  is  not  this?  And  only  one 
gray  hoof  among  all  the  four.” 

“  Yes ....  horses  are  a  bore,  I  begin  to  find,  like  everything  else. 
Always  falling  sick,  or  running  away,  or  breaking  one’s  peace  of 
mind  in  some  way  or  other.  Besides,  I  have  been  pestered  out  of  my 
life  there  in  Gyrene,  by  commissions  for  dogs  and  horses  and  bows 
from  that  old  episcopal  Nimrod,  Synesius.” 

“  What,  is  the  worthy  man  as  lively  as  ever?  ” 

“  Lively  ?  He  nearly  drove  me  into  a  nervous  fever  in  three  days. 
Up  at  four  in  the  morning,  always  in  the  most  disgustingly  good 
health  and  spirits,  farming,  coursing,  shooting,  riding  over  hedge 
and  ditch  after  rascally  black  robbers  ;  preaching,  intriguing,  bor¬ 
rowing  money ;  baptizing  and  excommunicating ;  bullying  that 
bully,  Andronicus  ;  comforting  old  women,  and  giving  pretty  girls 
dowries ;  scribbling  one  half-hour  on  philosophy,  and  the  next  on 
farriery  ;  sitting  up  all  night  writing  hymns  and  drinking  strong 
liquors  ;  off  again  on  horselback  at  four  the  next  morning  ;  and  talk¬ 
ing  by  the  hour  all  the  while  about  philosophic  abstraction  from  the 
mundane  tempest.  Heaven  defend  me  from  all  two-legged  whirl¬ 
winds  !  By  the  by,  there  was  a  fair  daughter  of  my  nation  came 
back  to  Alexandria  in  the  same  ship  with  me,  with  a  cargo  that  may 
suit  your  highness.” 

“  There  are  a  great  many  fair  daughters  of  your  nation  who  might 
suit  me,  without  any  cargo  at  all.” 

“  Ah,  they  have  had  good  practice,  the  little  fools,  over  since  the 
days  of  Jeroboam  the  son  of  Nebat.  But  I  mean  old  Miriam, — you 
know.  She  has  been  lending  Synesius  money  to  fight  the  black  fel¬ 
lows  with  ;  and  really  it  was  high  time.  They  had  burned  every 
homestead  for  miles  through  the  province.  But  the  daring  old  girl 
must  do  a  little  business  for  herself  ;  so  she  went  off,  in  the  teeth  of 
the  barbarians,  right  away  to  the  Atlas,  bought  all  their  lady  pris¬ 
oners,  and  some  of  their  own  sons  and  daughters,  too,  of  them,  for 
beads  and  old  iron  ;  and  has  come  back  with  as  pretty  a  cargo  of 
Libyan  beauties  as  a  prefect  of  good  taste  could  wish  to  have  the  first 
choice  of.  You  may  thank  me  for  that  privilege.” 

“After,  of  course,  you  had  suited  yourself,  my  cunning  Ra¬ 
phael  ?  ” 

“Not  I.  Women  are  bores,  as  Solomon  found  out  long  ago.  Did 
I  never  tell  you  ?  I  began,  as  he  did,  with  the  most  select  harem  in 
Alexandria.  But  they  quarreled  so,  that  one  day  I  went  out  and  sold 
them  all  but  one,  who  was  a  Jewess, — so  there  were  objections  on  the 
part  of  the  Eabbis.  Then  I  tried  one,  as  Solomon  did  ;  but  my  ‘  gar¬ 
den  shut  up’  and  my  ‘  sealed  fountain’  wanted  me  to  be  always  in 
love  with  her,  so  I  went  to  the  lawyers,  allowed  her  a  comfortable 


32 


IlYFATIA. 


maintenance,  and  now  I  am  as  free  as  a  monk,  and  shall  be  happy  to 
give  your  excellency  the  benefit  of  any  good  taste  or  experience 
which  I  may  possess.” 

“  Thanks,  worthy  Jew.  We  are  not  yet  as  exalted  as  yourself, 
and  will  send  for  the  old  Erictho  this  very  afternoon.  Now  listen  a 
moment  to  base,  earthly,  and  political  business.  Cyril  has  written 
to  me,  to  say  that  you  Jews  have  plotted  to  murder  all  the  Chris¬ 
tians.” 

“  Well, — why  not  ?  I  most  heartily  wish  it  were  true,  and  think, 
on  the  whole,  that  it  very  probably  is  so.” 

“  By  the  immortal — saints,  man  !  you  are  not  serious  ?” 

“  The  four  archangels  forbid  !  It  is  no  concern  of  mine.  All  I  say 
is,  that  my  people  are  great  fools,  like  the  rest  of  the  world,  and 
have,  for  aught  I  know  or  care,  some  such  intention.  They  won’t 
succeed,  of  course  ;  and  that  is  all  you  have  to  care  for.  But  if  you 
think  it  worth  the  trouble,  —  which  I  do  not, — I  shall  have  to  go  to 
the  synagogue  on  business  in  a  week  or  so,  and  then  I  would  ask 
some  of  the  Kabbis.” 

“  Laziest  of  men  ! — and  I  must  answer  Cyril  this  very  day.” 

“  An  additional  reason  for  asking  no  questions  of  our  people. 
Now  you  can  honestly  say  that  you  know  nothing  about  the  matter.” 

“  Well,  after  all,  ignorance  is  a  stronghold  for  poor  statesmen.  So 
you  need  not  hurry  yourself.” 

“  I  assure  your  excellency  I  will  not.” 

“  Ten  days  hence,  or  so,  you  know.” 

“  Exactly,  after  it  is  all  over.” 

“And  can’t  be  helped.  What  a  comfort  it  is,  now  and  then,  that 
Can’t  be  helped  !  ” 

“It  is  the  root  and  marrow  of  all  philosophy.  Your  practical  man, 
poor  wretch,  will  try  to  help  this  and  that,  and  torment  his  soul  with 
ways  and  means,  and  preventives  and  forestallings  :  your  philosopher 
quietly  says, — It  can’t  be  helped.  If  it  ought  to  be,  it  will  be  ;  if  it 
is,  it  ought  to  be.  We  did  not  make  the  world,  and  we  are  not 
responsible  for  it. — There  is  the  sum  and  substance  of  all  true  wis¬ 
dom,  and  the  epitome  of  all  that  has  been  said  and  written  thereon, 
from  Philo  the  Jew  to  Hypatia  the  Gentile.  By  the  way,  here’s 
Cyril  coming  down  the  steps  of  the  CaBsareum.  A  very  handsome 
fellow,  after  all,  though  he  is  looking  as  sulky  as  a  bear,” 

“  With  his  cubs  at  his  heels.  What  a  scoundrelly  visage  that  tali 
fellow — deacon,  or  reader,  or  whatever  he  is  by  his  dress — has.” 

“  There  they  are,  whispering  together.  Heaven  give  them  pleas¬ 
ant  thoughts  and  pleasanter  faces  !  ” 

“  Amen  !”  quoth  Orestes,  with  a  sneer:  and  he  would  have  said 
Amen  in  good  earnest,  had  he  been  able  to  take  the-  liberty — which 
we  shall — and  listen  to  Cyril’s  answer  to  Peter,  the  tall  reader. 

“  From  Hypatia’s  you  say  ?  Why,  he  only  returned  to  the  city 
this  morning.” 


THE  HYim  WORLD. 


83 


“  I  saw  his  four-in-liand  standing  at  her  door,  as  1  came  down  the 
Museum  street  hither,  half  an  hour  ago.” 

“  And  twenty  carriages  besides,  I  don’t  doubt  ?” 

“  The  street  was  blocked  up  with  them.  There  !  Look  round  the 
corner  now. — Chariots,  litters,  slaves,  and  fops. — When  shall  we  see 
such  a  concourse  as  that  where  it  ought  to  be  ?  ” 

Cyril  made  no  answer  ,  and  Peter  went  on, — “  Where  it  ought  to 
be,  my  father, — in  front  of  your  door  at  the  Serapeium  ?  ” 

“  The  world,  the  fiesli,  and  the  Devil  know  their  own,  Peter  :  and 
as  long  as  they  have  their  own  to  go  to,  we  cannot  expect  them  to 
come  to  us.” 

“But  what  if  their  own  were  taken  out  of  the  way?” 

“  They  might  come  to  us  for  want  of  better  amusement.  . .  .Devil 
and  all.  Well,  if  I  could  get  a  fair  hold  of  the  two  first,  I  would 
take  the  third  into  the  bargain,  and  see  what  could  be  done  with  him. 
But  never,  while  these  lecture-rooms  fast,  these  Egyptian  chambers  of 
imagery,  these  theaters  of  Satan,  where  the  Devil  transforms  himself 
into  an  angel  of  light,  and  apes  Christian  virtue,  and  bedizens  his 
ministers  like  ministers  of  righteousness, — as  long  as  that  lecture- 
room  stands,  and  the  great  and  the  powerful  flock  to  it,  to  learn  ex¬ 
cuses  for  their  own  tyrannies  and  atheisms,  so  long  will  the  kingdom 
of  God  be  trampled  under  foot  in  Alexandria  ;  so  long  will  the  princes 
of  this  world,  with  their  gladiators,  and  parasites,  and  money-lenders, 
be  masters  here,  and  not  the  bishops  and  priests  of  the  living  God.” 

It  was  now  Peter’s  turn  to  be  silent  ;  and  as  the  two,  with  their 
little  knot  of  district  visitors  behind  them,  walk  moodily  along  the 
great  esplanade  which  overlooked  the  harbor,  and  then  vanish  sud¬ 
denly  up  some  dingy  alley  into  the  crowded  misery  of  the  sailors’ 
qaurter,  we  will  leave  them  to  go  about  their  errand  of  mercy,  and, 
like  fashionable  people,  keep  to  the  grand  parade,  and  listen  again  to 
our  two  fashionable  friends  in  the  carved  and  gilded  curricle  with 
four  white-blood-horses. 

“  A  fine  sparkling  breeze  outside  the  Pharos,  Eaphael, — fair  for  thf 
wheat-ships,  too.” 

“  Are  they  gone  yet?” 

“  Tes, — why?  I  sent  the  first  fleet  off  three  days  ago  ;  and  the 
rest  are  clearing  outwards  to-day.” 

“  Oh — ah — so  I — Then  you  have  not  heard  from  Heraclian  ?  ” 

“  Heraclian?  What  the — blessed  saints  has  the  Count  of  Africa  to 
do  with  my  wheat -ships  ?  ” 

“  O,  nothing.  It’s  no  business  of  mine.  Only  he  is  going  to  rebel. 

. . .  .But  here  we  are  at  your  door.” 

“  To  what?”  asked  Orestes  in  a  horrified  tone. 

“  To  rebel,  and  attack  Rome.” 

“  Good  gods — God  I  mean  !  A  fresh  bore  !  Come  in,  and  tell  a 
poor  miserable  slave  of  a  governor — speak  low,  for  heaven’s  sake  1 — 
I  hope  these  rascally  grooms  haven’t  overheard  you.” 

HYPATIA — 3 


34 


HYPATIA. 


'  Easy  to  throw  them  into  the  canal,  if  they  have,”  quoth  Raphael, 
as  he  walked  coolly  through  hall  and  corridor  after  the  perturbed 
governor. 

Poor  Orestes  never  stopped  till  he  reached  a  little  chamber  of  the 
inner  court,  beckoned  the  Jew  in  after  him,  locked  the  door,  threw 
himself  into  an  arm-chair,  put  his  hands  on  his  knees,  and  sat,  bend¬ 
ing  forward,  staring  into  Raphael’s  face  with  a  ludicrous  terror  and 
perplexity, 

“  Tell  me  all  about  it.  Tell  me  this  instant  !  ” 

“  I  have  told  you  all  I  know,”  quoth  Raphael,  quietly  seating  him¬ 
self  on  a  sofa,  and  playing  with  a  jeweled  dagger.  “  I  thought  of 
course,  that  you  were  in  the  secret,  or  I  should  have  said  nothing. 
It’s  no  business  of  mine,  you  know.” 

Orestes,  like  most  weak  and  luxurious  men,  Romans  especially, 
had  a  wild-beast  vein  in  him, — and  it  burst  forth. 

“  Hell  and  the  furies!  You  insolent  provincial  slave,  you  will 
carry  these  liberties  of  yours  too  far  1  Do  you  know  who  I  am,  you 
accursed  Jew  I  Tell  me  the  whole  truth,  or,  by  the  head  of  the  em¬ 
peror,  I’ll  twist  it  out  of  you  with  red-hot  pincers  I  ” 

Raphael’s  countenance  assumed  a  dogged  expression,  which  showed 
that  the  old  Jewish  blood  still  beat  true,  under  all  its  affected  shell  of 
Neo-Platonist  nonchalance  ;  and  there  was  a  quiet,  unpleasant  earnest 
ill  his  smile,  as  he  answered, — 

“  Then,  my  dear  governor,  you  will  be  the  first  man  on  earth  who 
ever  yet  forced  a  Jew  to  say  or  do  what  he  did  not  choose.” 

“  VVe’ll  see  1  ”  yelled  Orestes.  “  Here,  slaves  1  ”  And  he  clapped 
his  hands  loudly. 

“  Calm  yourself,  your  excellency,”  quoth  Raphael,  rising.  “The 
door  is  locked  ;  the  mosquito-net  is  across  the  window  ;  and  this 
dagger  is  poisoned.  If  anything  happens  to  me,  you  will  offend  all  the 
Jew  money-lenders,  and  die  in  about  three  days  in  a  great  deal  of  pain, 
having  missed  our  assignation  with  old  Miriam,  lost  your  pleasantest 
companion,  and  left  your  own  finances  and  those  of  the  prefecture  in 
a  considerable  state  of  embarrassment.  How  much  better  to  sit 
down,  hear  all  I  have  to  say  philosophically,  like  a  true  pupil  of 
Hypatia,  and  not  expect  a  man  to  tell  you  what  he  really  does  not 
know.” 

Orestes,  after  looking  vainly  round  the  room  for  a  place  to  escape, 
had  quietly  subsided  into  his  chair  again  ;  and  by  the  time  that  the 
slaves  knocked  at  the  door,  he  had  so  far  recovered  his  philosophy  as 
to  ask,  not  for  the  torturers,  but  for  a  page  and  wine. 

“O  you  Jews!”  quoth  he,  trying  to  laugh  off  matters.  “The 
same'incarnate  fiends  that  Titus  found  you  !  ” 

“  The  very  same,  my  dear  prefect.  Now  for  this  matter,  which  is 
really  important, — at  least  to  Gentiles.  Heraclian  will  certainly 
rebel.  Synesius  let  out  as  much  to  me.  He  has  fitted  out  an  arma¬ 
ment  for  Ostia,  stopped  his  own  wheat-ships,  and  is  going  to  write  to 


THE  DYING  WOULD. 


35 


you  to  stop  yours,  and  to  starve  out  tlie  Eternal  City,  Gotlis,  senate, 
emperor  and  all.  Whether  you  will  comply  with  his  reasonable  little 
request  depends  of  course  on  yourself.” 

“  And  that,  again,  very  much  on  his  plans.” 

“Of  course.  You  cannot  be  expected  to — we  will  euphemize — 
unless  it  be  made  worth  your  while.” 

Orestes  sat  buried  in  deep  thought. 

“Of  course  not,”  said  he  at  last,  half  unconsciously.  And  then, 
in  sudden  dread  of  having  committed  himself,  he  looked  up  fiercely 
at  the  Jew. 

“  And  how  do  I  know  that  this  is  not  some  infernal  trap  of  yours? 
Tell  me,  how  you  found  out  all  this,  or  by  Hercules  (he  had  quite  for¬ 
gotten  his  Christianity  by  this  time) — by  Hercules  and  the  Twelve 
Gods,  I’ll - ” 

“  Don’t  use  expressions  unworthy  of  a  philosopher.  My  source  of 
information  was  very  simple  and  very  good.  He  has  been  negotiat. 
ing  a  loan  from  the  Rabbis  at  Carthage.  They  were  either  fright¬ 
ened,  or  loyal,  or  both,  and  hung  back.  He  knew — as  all  wise 
governors  know  when  they  allow  themselves  time — that  it  is  no,  use 
to  bully  a  Jew  ;  and  applied  to  me.  I  never  lend  money, — it  is  un- 
philosophical  :  but  I  introduced  him  to  old  Miriam,  who  dare  do 
business  with  the  Devil  himself  ;  and  by  that  move,  whether  he  has 
the  money  or  not,  I  cannot  tell :  but  this  I  can  tell,  that  we  have  his 
secret, — and  so  have  you  now  ;  and  if  you  want  more  information, 
the  old  woman,  who  enjoys  an  intrigue  as  much  as  she  does  Faler- 
uian,  will  give  it  you.” 

“  Well,  you  are  a  true  friend,  after  all.” 

Of  course  I  am.  Now,  is  not  this  method  of  getting  at  the  truth 
much  easier  and  pleasanter  than  setting  a  couple  of  dirty  negroes  to 
pinch  and  pull  me,  and  so  making  it  a  point  of  honor  with  me  to  tell 
you  nothing  but  lies?  Here  comes  Ganymede  with  the  wine,  just  in 
time  to  calm  your  nerves,  and  fill  you  with  the  spirit  of  divination. 
...  .To  the  goddess  of  good  counsels,  my  lord  ?  What  wine  this  is  !  ” 

“  True  Syrian, — fire  and  honey  ;  fourteen  years  old  next  vintage, 
my  Raphael.  Out,  Hypocorisma  !  See  that  he  is  not  listening.  The  , 
impudent  rascal  !  I  was  humbugged  into  giving  two  thousand  gold 
pieces  for  him  two  years  ago,  he  was  so  pretty, — they  said  he  was 
only  just  rising  thirteen, — and  he  has  been  the  plague  of  my  life  ever 
since,  and  is  beginning  to  want  the  barber  already.  Now,  what  is 
the  Count  dreaming  of  ?  ” 

“  His  wages  for  killing  Stilicho.” 

^  “  What,  is  it  not  enough  to  be  Count  of  Africa?” 

“  I  suppose  he  sets  oS  against  that  his  services  during  the  last 
three  years.” 

‘•Well,  he  saved  Africa.” 

And  thereby  Egypt  also.  And  you,  too,  as  well  as  the  emperor, 
may  be  considered  as  owing  him  somewhat.” 


86 


HYPATIA. 


‘'My  good  friend,  my  debts  are  far  too  numerous  for  me  to  think 
of  payinff  any  of  them.  But  what  wages  does  he  want  ?  ” 

“  The  purple.” 

Orestes  started,  and  then  fell  into  thought.  Raphael  sat  watching 
him  awhile. 

“  Now,  most  noble  lord,  may  I  depart  ?  I  haye  said  all  I  have  to 
say ;  and  unless  I  get  home  to  luncheon  at  once,  I  shall  hardly  have 
time  to  find  old  Miriam  for  you,  and  get  through  our  little  affair  with 
her  before  sunset.” 

“  Stay.  What  force  has  he  ?” 

“  Forty  thousand  already,  they  say.  And  those  Donatist  rufiSans 
are  with  him  to  a  man,  if  he  can  but  scrape  together  wherewith  to 
change  their  bludgeons  into  good  steel.” 

“  Well,  go . So.  A  hundred  thousand  might  do  it,”  said  he, 

meditating,  as  Raphael  bowed  himself  out.  “  He  won’t  get  them. 
I  don’t  know,  though  ;  the  man  has  the  head  of  a  Julius.  Well, — 
that  fool  Attalus  talked  of  joining  Egypt  to  the  Western  Empire. 
....  Not  such  a  bad  thought  either.  Anything  is  better  than  being 
governed  by  an  idiot  child  and  three  canting  nuns.  I  expect  to  be 
excommunicated  every  day  for  some  offense  against  Pulcheria’s  prud¬ 
ery . Heraclian  emperor  at  Rome  ....  and  I  lord  and  master  on 

this  side  the  sea  ....  the  Donatists  pitted  again  fairly  against  the 
orthodox,  to  cut  each  other’s  throats  in  peace  ....  no  more  of  Cyril’s 

spying  and  tale-bearing  to  Constantinople . Not  such  a  bad  dish 

of  fare  ....  But  then — it  would  take  so  much  trouble  !  ” 

With  which  words  Orestes  went,  into  his  third  warm  bath  for  that 
day. 


CHAPTER  III. 


THE  GOTHS. 

Foh  two  days  tlie  young  monk  held  on,  paddling  and  floating 
rapidly  down  the  Nile-stream,  leaving  city  after  city  to  right  and  left 
with  longing  eyes,  and  looking  hack  to  one  villa  after-  another,  till 
the  reaches  of  the  hanks  hid  them  from  his  sight,  with  many  a  yearn¬ 
ing  to  know  what  sort  of  places  those  gay  huildings  and  gardens 
would  look  like  on  a  nearer  view,  and  what  sort  of  life  the  thousands 
led  who  crowded  the  busy  quays,  and  walked  and  drove,  in  an  end¬ 
less  stream,  along  the  great  high-roads  which  ran  along  either 
hank.  He  carefully  avoided  every  hoat  that  passed  him,  from  the 
gilded  harge  of  the  wealthy  landlord  or  merchant,  to  the  tiny  raft 
huoyed  up  with  empty  jars,  which  was  floating  down  to  he  sold  at 
some  market  in  the  Delta.  Here  and  there  he  met  and  hailed  a  crew 
of  monks,  drawing  their  nets  in  a  quiet  hay,  or  passing  along  the 
great  watery  highway  from  monastery  to  monastery  :  hut  all  the 
news  he  received  from  them  was,  that  the  canal  of  Alexandria  was 
stiir several  days’ journey  helow  him.  Ii  seemed  endless,  that  monot¬ 
onous  vista  of  the  two  high  clay  hanks,  with  their  sluices  and  water¬ 
wheels,  their  knots  of  palms  and  date-trees  ;  endless  seemed  that 
wearisome  succession  of  hars  of  sand  and  hanks  of  mud,  every  one 
like  the  one  before  it,  every  one  dotted  with  the  same  line  of  logs 
and  stones  strev/n  along  the  water’s  edge,  which  turned  out,  as  he 
approached  them,  to  be  basking  crocodiles  and  sleeping  pelicans. 
His  eye,  wearied  with  the  continual  confinement  and  want  of  dis¬ 
tance,  longed  for  the  boundless  expanse  of  the  desert,  for  the  jagged 
outlines  of  those  far-off  hills,  which  he  had  watched  from  boyhood 
rising  mysteriously  at  morn  out  of  the  eastern  sky,  and  melting  mys¬ 
teriously  into  it  again  at  even,  beyond  which  dwelt  a  whole  world  of 
wonders,  elephants  and  dragons,  satyrs  and  anthropophagi, — ay,  and 
the  phoenix  itself.  Tired  and  melancholy,  his  mind  returned  inward 
to  prey  on  itself,  and  the  last  words  of  Arsenius  rose  again  and  again 
to  his  thoughts.  “  Was  his  call  of  the  spirit  or  of  the  flesh?”  How 
should  he  test  that  problem  ?  He  wished  to  see  the  world  ....  that 
might  he  carnal.  True  ;  hut  he  wished  to  convert  the  world  .  .  .  .was 
not  that  spiritual  ?  Was  he  not  going  on  a  noble  errand  ?  . . . .  thirst¬ 
ing  for  toil,  for  saintship,  for  martyrdom  itself,  if  it  would  but  come 
and  cut  the  Gordian  knot  of  all  temptations,  and  save  him — for  he 
dimly  felt  that  it  would  save  him — a  whole  sea  of  trouble  ir  getting 

(37) 


88 


HYPATIA. 


safe  and  triumpliant  out  of  tliat  world  into  wliicli  lie  liad  not  yet 
entered  ....  and  his  heart  shrunk  hack  from  the  untried,  homeless 
wilderness  before  him.  But  no  I  the  die  was  cast,  and  he  must  down 
and  onward,  whether  in  obedience  to  the  spirit  or  the  flesh.  O  for 
one  hour  of  the  quiet  of  that  dear  Laura  and  the  old  familiar  faces  ! 

At  last,  a  sudden  turn  of  the  bank  brought  him  in  sight  of  a  gaudi¬ 
ly  painted  barge,  on  board  of  which  armed  men,  in  uncouth  and 
foreign  dresses,  were  chasing  with  barbaric  shouts  some  large  object 
in  the  water.  In  the  bows  stood  a  man  of  gigantic  stature,  bran¬ 
dishing  a  harpoon  in  his  right  hand,  and  in  his  left  holding  the  line 
of  a  second,  the  head  of  which  was  flxed  in  the  huge  purple  sides  of  a 
hippopotamus,  who  foamed  and  wallowed  a  few  yards  down  the 
stream.  An  old  grizzled  warrior  at  the  stern,  with  a  rudder  in  either 
hand,  kept  the  boat’s  head  continually  toward  the  monster,  in  spite 
of  its  sudden  and  frantic  wheelings  ;  and  when  it  dashed  madly 
across  the  stream,  some  twenty  ores  flashed  through  the  water  in 
pursuit.  All  was  activity  and  excitement ;  and  it  was  no  wonder  if 
Philammon’s  curiosity  had  tempted  him  to  drift  down  almost  abreast 
of  the  barge,  ere  he  descried,  peeping  from  under  a  decorated  awning 
in  the  after-part,  some  dozen  pairs  of  languishing  black  eyes,  turned 
alternately  to  the  game  and  to  himself.  The  serpents, — chattering 
and  smiling  with  pretty  little  shrieks,  and  shaking  of  glossy  curls 
and  gold  necklaces,  and  fluttering  of  muslin  dresses,  within  a  dozen 
yards  of  him  !  Blushing  scarlet,  he  knew  not  why,  he  seized  his 
paddle,  and  tried  to  back  out  of  the  snare  ....  but  somehow,  his 
very  efforts  to  escape  those  sparkling  eyes  diverted  his  attention 
from  everything  else  :  the  hippopotamus  had  caught  sight  of  him, 
and,  furious  with  pain,  rushed  straight  at  the  unoffending  canoe  ; 
the  harpoon -line  became  entangled  round  his  body,  and  in  a  moment 
he  and  his  frail  bark  were  overturned,  and  the  monster,  with  his 
huge  white  tusks  gaping  wide ,  close  on  him  as  he  struggled  in  the 
stream. 

Luckily,  Philammon,  contrary  to  the  wont  of  monks,  was  a  bather, 
and  swam  like  a  water-fowl  :  fear  he  had  never  known  :  death  from 
childhood  had  been  to  him,  as  to  the  other  inmates  of  the  Laura,  a 
contemplation  too  perpetual  to  have  any  paralyzing  terror  in  it,  even 
then,  when  life  seemed  just  about  to  open  on  him  anew.  But  the 
monk  was  a  man,  and  a  young  one,  and  had  no  intention  of  dying 
tamely  or  unavenged.  In  an  instant  he  had  freed  himself  from  the 
line,  drawn  the  short  knife,  which  was  his  only  weapon,  and,  diving 
suddenly,  avoided  the  monster’s  rush,  and  attacked  him  from  behind 
with  stabs,  which,  though  not  deep,  still  dyed  the  waters  with  gore 
at  every  stroke.  The  barbarians  shouted  with  delight.  The  hippo¬ 
potamus  turned  furiously  against  his  new  assailant,  crushing,  alas  ! 
the  empty  canoe  to  fragments  with  a  single  snap  of  his  enormous 
jaws  ;  but  the  turn  was  fatal  to  him  ;  the  barge  was  close  upon  him, 
and,  as  he  presented  his  broad  side  to  the  blow,  the  sinewy  arm  of 


Tim  GOTTIS. 


39 


ehe  giant  drove  a  harpoon  througli  liis  heart,  and  with  one  convulsive 
shudder  the  huge  blue  mass  turned  over  on  its  side  and  floated  dead. 

Poor  Pliilammon  !  He  alone  was  silent,  amid  the  yells  of  triumph; 
sorrowfully  he  swam  round  and  round  his  little  paper  wreck.  . .  .it 
would  not  have  floated  a  mouse.  Wistfully  he  eyed  the  distant 
banks,  half-minded  to  strike  out  for  them  and  escape  ....  and 
thought  of  the  crocodiles,  ....  and  paddled  round  again,  and  thought 
of  the  basilisk  eyes  ;  ....  he  might  escape  the  crocodiles,  but  who 
could  escape  women  ?  . . . .  and  he  struck  out  valiantly  for  shore.  .  .  . 
when  he  was  brought  to  a  sudden  stop  by  finding  the  stem  of  the 
barge  close  on  him,  a  noose  thrown  over  him  by  some  friendly  bar¬ 
barian,  and  himself  hauled  on  board,  amid  the  laughter,  praise,  as¬ 
tonishment,  and  grumbling  of  the  good-natured  crew,  who  had  ex¬ 
pected  him,  as  a  matter  of  course,  to  avail  himself  at  once  of  their 
help,  and  could  not  conceive  the  cause  of  his  reluctance. 

Pliilammon  gazed  with  wonder  on  his  strange  hosts,  their  pale 
complexions,  globular  heads  and  faces,  high  cheek-bones,  tall  and 
sturdy  figures  ;  their  red  beards,  and  yellow  hair  knotted  fantastic¬ 
ally  above  the  head  ;  their  awkward  dresses,  half  Roman  or  Egyp¬ 
tian,  and  half  of  foreign  fur,  soiled  and  stained  in  many  a  storm  and 
fight,  but  tastelessly  bedizened  with  classic  jewels,  brooches,  and 
Roman  coins,  strung  like  necklaces.  Only  the  steersman,  who  had 
come  forward  to  Avonder  at  the  hoppopotamus,  and  to  help  in  drag¬ 
ging  the  unwieldy  brute  on  board,  seemed  to  keep  genuine  and  un¬ 
ornamented  the  costume  of  his  race,  the  white  linen  leggings, 
strapped  with  thongs  of  deer-skin,  the  quilted  leather  cuirass,  the 
bear’s-fur  cloak,  the  only  ornaments  of  which  were  the  fangs  and 
claws  of  the  beast  itself,  and  a  fringe  of  grizzled  tufts,  which  looked 
but  too  like  human  hair.  The  language  which  they  spoke  was 
utterly  unintelligible  to  Pliilammon,  though  it  need  not  be  so  to  us. 

“  A  well-grown  lad  and  a  brave  one,  Wulf  the  son  of  Ovida,”  said 
the  giant  to  the  old  hero  of  the  bear-skin  cloak;  “and  understands 
wearing  skins,  in  this  furnace-mouth  of  a  climate,  rather  better  than 
you  do.” 

“  I  keep  to  the  dress  of  my  forefathers,  Amalric  the  Amah  What 
did  to  sack  Rome  in,  may  do  to  find  Asgard  in.” 

The  giant,  who  was  decked  out  with  helmet,  cuirass,  and  senato¬ 
rial  boots,  in  a  sort  of  mongrel  mixture  of  the  Roman  military  and 
civil  dress,  his  neck  wreathed  with  a  dozen  gold  chains,  and  every 
finger  sparkling  with  jewels,  turned  away  with  an  impatient  sneer. 

“Asgard, — Asgard?  If  you  are  in  such  a  hurry  to  get  to  Asgard 
up  this  ditch  in  the  sand,  you  had  better  ask  the  fellow  how  far  it  is 
thither.” 

Wulf  took  him  quietly  at  his  word,  and  addressed  a  question  to 
the  young  monk,  which  he  could  only  answer  by  a  shake  of  the  head. 

“  Ask  iiim  in  Greek,  man.” 

“  Greek  is  a  slave’s  tongue.  Make  a  slave  talk  to  him  in  it,  not  me.” 


40 


HYPATIA. 


“  Here,  some  of  you  girls  !  Pelagia  !  you  understand  tliis  fellow’s 
talk.  Ask  liim  how  far  it  is  to  Asgard.” 

“You  must  ask  me  more  civilly,  my  rough  hero,”  replied  a  soft 
voice  from  underneath  the  awning.  “  Beauty  must  he  sued,  and  not 
commanded.” 

“Come,  then,  my  olive-tree,  my  gazelle,  my  lotus-flower,  my — 
what  was  the  last  nonsense  you  taught  me  ? — and  ask  this  wild  man 
of  the  sands  how  far  it  is  from  these  accursed  endless  rahbit-burrows 
to  Asgard.” 

Tlie  awning  was  raised,  and,  lying  luxuriously  on  a  soft  mattress, 
fanned  with  peacock’s  feathers,  and  glittering  with  rubies  and  to¬ 
pazes,  appeared  such  a  vision  as  Philammon  had  never  seen  before. 

A  woman  of  some  two-and-twenty  summers,  formed  in  the  most 
voluptuous  mold  of  Grecian  beauty,  whose  complexion  showed 
every  violet  vein  through  its  veil  of  luscious  brown.  Her  little  bare 
feet,  as  they  dimpled  the  cushions,  were  more  perfect  than  Aphro¬ 
dite’s,  softer  than  a  swan’s  bosom.  Every  swell  of  her  bust  and 
arms  showed  through  the  thin  gauze  robe,  while  her  lower  limbs 
were  wrapped  in  a  shawl  of  orange  silk,  embroidered  with  wreaths 
of  shells  and  roses.  Her  dark  hair  lay  carefully  spread  out  upon  the 
pillow,  in  a  thousand  ringlets  int wined  with  gold  and  jewels  ;  her 
languishing  eyes  blazed  like  diamonds  from  a  cavern,  under  eyelids 
darkened  and  deepened  with  blkck  antimony  ;  her  lips  pouted  of 
themselves,  by  habit  or  by  nature,  into  a  perpetual  kiss  ;  slowly  she 
raised  one  little  lazy  hand ;  slowly  the  ripe  lips  opened  ;  and  in  most 
pure  and  melodious  Attic,  she  lisped  her  huge  lover’s  question  to  the 
monk,  and  repeated  it  before  the  boy  could  shake  off  the  spell,  and 
answer. . .  . 

“  Asgard  ?  What  is  Asgard  ?  ” 

The  beauty  looked  at  the  giant  for  further  instructions. 

“  The  City  of  the  immortal  Gods,”  interposed  the  old  warrior, 
hastily  and  sternly,  to  the  lady. 

“  The  city  of  God  is  in  heaven,”  said  Philammon  to  the  inter¬ 
preter,  turning  his  head  away  from  those  gleaming,  luscious,  search¬ 
ing  glances. 

His  ansAver  was  received  with  a  general  laugh  by  all  except  the 
leader,  who  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

“  ft  may  as  well  be  up  in  the  skies  as  up  the  Nile.  We  shall  be 
just  as  likely,  I  believe,  to  reach  it  by  flying,  as  by  rowing  up  this 
big  ditch.  Ask  him  where  the  river  comes  from,  Pelagia.” 

Pelagia  obeyed, ...  .and  thereon  followed  a  confusion  worse  con¬ 
founded,  composed  of  all  the  impossible  wonders  of  that  mythic 
fairy-land  with  which  Philammon  had  gorged  himself  from  hoyhobd 
in  his  walks  with  the  old  monks,  and  of  the  equally  trustworthy 
traditions  which  the  Goths  had  picked  up  at  Alexandria.  There  was 
nothing  which  that  river  did  not  do.  It  rose  in  the  Caucasus.  Where 
was  the  Caucasus?  He  did  not  know.  In  Paradise, — in  Indian 


THE  GOTHS. 


41 


Ethiopia, — in  Ethiopian  India.  Where  were  they?  He  did  not 
know.  Nobody  knew.  It  ran  for  a  hundred  and  fifty  days’  journey 
through  deserts  where  nothing  but  flying  serpents  and  satyrs  lived, 
and  the  very  lions’  manes  were  burned  off  by  the  heat.  . . . 

“  Good  sporting  there,  at  all  events,  among  these  dragons,”  quoth 
Smid,  the  son  of  Troll,  armorer  to  the  party. 

“As  good  as  Thor’s  when  he  caught  Snake  Midgard  with  the 
bullock’s  head,”  said  Wulf. 

It  turned  to  the  east  for  a  hundred  days’  journey  more,  all  round 
Arabia  and  India,  among  forests  full  of  elephants  and  dog-headed 
women. 

“  Better  and  better,  Smid  !”  growled  Wulf,  approvingly. 

“Fresh  beef  cheap  there,  Prince  Wulf,  eh?”  quoth  Smid.  “I 
must  look  over  the  arrow-heads.” 

— To  the  mountains  of  the  Hyperboreans,  where  there  was  eternal 

night,  and  the  air  was  full  of  feathers . That  is,  one-third  of  it 

came  from  thence,  and  another  third  came  from  the  Southern  Ocean, 
over  the  Moon  Mountains,  where  no  one  had  ever  been,  and  the  re¬ 
maining  third  from  the  country  where  the  phoenix  lived,  and  nobody 
knew  where  that  was.  And  then  there  were  the  cataracts,  and  the 
inundations, — and — and — and  above  the  cataracts,  nothing  but  sand¬ 
hills  and  ruins,  as  full  of  devils  as  they  could  hold. . .  .and  as  for 
Asgard,  no  one  had  ever  heard  of  it. . .  .till  every  face  grew  longer 
and  longer,  as  Pelagia  went  on  interpreting  and  misinterpreting 
and  at  last  the  giant  smote  his  hand  upon  his  knee,  and  sworeagreai 
oath  that  Asgard  might  rot  till  the  twilight  of  the  gods  before  he 
went  a  step  farther  up  the  Nile. 

“Curse  the  monk  !”  growled  Wulf.  “How  should  such  a  poor 
beast  know  anything  about  the  matter  ?  ” 

“  Why  should  not  he  know  as  well  as  that  ape  of  a  Roman  gov¬ 
ernor  ?  ”  asked  Smid. 

“Oh,  the  monks  know  everything,”  said  Pelagia.  “They  go 
hundreds  and  thousands  of  miles  up  the  river,  and  cross  the  deserts 
among  the  fiends  and  monsters,  where  anyone  else  would  be  eaten 
up,  or  go  mad  at  once.” 

“  Ah,  the  dear  holy  men  !  It’s  all  by  the  sign  of  the  blessed  cross  !  ” 
exclaimed  all  the  girls  together,  devoutly  crossing  themselves,  while 
two  or  three  of  the  most  enthusiastic  were  half-minded  to  go  forward 
and  kneel  to  Philammon  for  his  blessing ;  but  hesitated,  their  Gothic 
lovers  being  heathenishly  stupid  and  prudish  on  such  points. 

“Why  should  he  not  know  as  well  as  the  prefect?  Well  said, 
Smid  !  I  believe  that  prefect’s  quill-driver  was  humbugging  us  when 
he  said  Asgard  was  only  ten  days’  sail  up.” 

“  Why?”  asked  Wulf. 

“I  never  give  any  reasons.  What’s  the  use  of  being  an  Amal, 
and  a  son  of  Odin,  if  one  has  always  to  be  giving  reasons  like  a  ras¬ 
cally  Roman  lawyer  ?  I  say  the  governor  looked  like  a  liar  ;  and  I 


42 


HYPATIA. 


say  this  monk  looks  like  an  honest  fellow  ;  and  I  choose  to  believe 
him,  and  there’s  an  end  of  it.” 

“Don’t  look  so  cross  at  me,  Prince  Wulf  ;  I’m  sure  it’s  not  my 
fault ;  I  could  only  say  what  the  monk  told  me,”  whispered  poor 
Pelagia. 

“Who  looks  cross  at  you,  my  queen?”  roared  the  Amal.  “Let 
me  have  him  out  here,  and  by  Thor’s  hammer.  I’ll - ” 

“  Who  spoke  to  you,  you  stupid  darling?”  answered  Pelagia,  who 
lived  in  hourly  fear  of  thunder-storms.  “  Who  is  going  to  be  cross 
with  anyone,  except  I  with  you,  for  mishearing,  and  misunderstand¬ 
ing,  and  meddling,  as  you  are  always  doing  ?  I  shall  do  as  I  threat¬ 
ened,  and  run  away  with  Prince  Wulf,  if  you  are  not  good.  Don’t 
you  see  that  the  whole  crew  are  expecting  you  to  make  them  an 
oration  ?  ” 

Whereupon  the  Amal  rose, 

“  See  you  here,  Wulf,  the  son  of  Ovida,  and  warriors  all  !  If  we 
want  wealth,  we  sha’n’t  find  it  among  the  sand-hills.  If  we  want 
women,  we  shall  find  nothing  prettier  than  these  among  dragons  and 
devils.  Don’t  look  angry,  Wulf.  You  have  no  mind  to  marry  one  of 
those  dog-headed  girls  the  monk  talked  of,  have  you?  Well,  then, 
we  have  money  and  women  ;  and  if  we  want  sport,  it’s  better  sport 
killing  men  than  killing  beasts  ;  so  we  had  better  go  where  we  shall 
find  most  of  that  game,  which  we  certainly  shall  not  up  this  road. 
As  for  fame  and  all  that,  though  I’ve  had  enough,  there’s  plenty  to 
be  got  anywhere  along  the  shores  of  that  Mediterranean.  Let’s  burn 
and  plunder  Alexandria  :  forty  of  us  Goths  might  kill  down  all  those 
donkey-riders  in  two  days,  and  hang  up  that  lying  prefect  who  sent 
us  here  on  this  fool’s  errand.  Don’t  answer,  Wulf,  .1  knew  he  was 
humbugging  us  all  along,  but  you  were  so  open-mouthed  to  all  he 
said,  that  I  was  bound  to  let  my  elders  choose  for  me.  Let’s  go 
back  ;  send  over  for  any  of  the  tribes  ;  send  to  Spain  for  those  Van¬ 
dals, — they  have  had  enough  of  Adolph  by  now,  curse  him  ! — I’ll 
warrant  them  ;  get  together  an  army,  and  take  Constantinople.  I’ll 
be  Augustus,  and  Pelagia,  Augusta  ;  you  and  Smid  here,  the  two 
Caesars  ;  and  we’ll  make  the  monk  the  chief  of  the  eunuchs,  eh  ? — 
anything  you  like  for  a  quiet  life  ;  but  up  this  accursed  kennel  of  hot 
water  I  go  no  farther.  Ask  your  girls,  my  heroes,  and  I’ll  ask  mine. 
Women  are  all  prophetesses,  every  one  of  them.” 

“  When  they  are  not  harlots,”  growled  Wulf  to  himself. 

“  I  will  go  to  the  world’s  end  with  you,  my  king  !  ”  sighed  Pelagia; 
“  but  Alexandria  is  certainly  pleasanter  than  this.” 

Old  Wulf  sprang  up  fiercely  enough, 

“  Hear  me,  Amalric  the  Amal,  son  of  Odin,  and  heroes  all  !  When 
my  fathers  swore  to  be  Odin’s  men,  and  gave  up  the  kingdom  to  the 
holy  Amals,  the  sons  of  the  AUsir,  what  was  the  bond  between  your 
fathers  and  mine  ?  Was  it  not  that  we  should  move  and  move,  south¬ 
ward  and  southward  ever,  till  we  came  back  to  Asgard,  the  city  where 


THE  GOTHS. 


43 


Odin  dwells  forever,  and  gave  into  liis  hands  the  kingdom  of  all  the 
earth  ?  And  did  we  not  keep  our  oath  ?  Have  we  not  held  to  the 
Amals  ?  Did  we  not  leave  Adolph,  because  we  would  not  follow  a 
Balth,  while  there  was  an  Amal  to  lead  us  ?  Have  we  not  been  true 
men  to  you,  son  of  the  AEsir  ?  ” 

“  No  man  ever  saw  Wulf,  the  son  of  Ovida,  fail  friend  or  foe.” 

“  Then  why  does  his  friend  fail  him?  Why  does  his  friend  fail 
himself  ?  If  the  bison-bull  lie  down  and  wallow,  what  will  the  herd 
do  for  leader?  If  the  king- wolf  lose  the  scent,  how  will  the  pack 
hold  it  ?  If  the  Yngling  forgets  the  song  of  Asgard,  who  will  sing 
it  to  the  heroes  ?  ” 

“Sing  it  yourself,  if  you  choose.  Pelagia  sings  quite  well  enough 
for  me.” 

In  an  instant  the  cunning  beauty  caught  at  the  hint,  and  poured 
forth  a  soft,  low,  sleepy  song  : — 

“  Loose  the  sail,  rest  the  oar,  float  away  down, 

Fleeting  and  gliding  by  tower  and  town  ; 

Life  is  so  short  at  best !  snatch,  while  thou  canst,  thy  rest, 

Sleeping  by  me  I  ” 

"  Can  you  answer  that,  Wulf  ?  ”  shouted  a  dozen  voices. 

“Hear  the  song  of  Asgard,  warriors  of  the  Goths  !  Did  not  Alaric 
the  king  love  it  well  ?  Did  I  not  sing  it  before  him  in  the  palace  of 
the  Caesars,  till  he  swore,  for  all  the  Christian  that  he  was,  to  go 
southward  in  search  of  the  holy  city  ?  And  when  he  went  to  Vah 
halla,  and  the  ships  were  wrecked  off  Sicily,  and  Adolph  the  Balth 
turned  back  like  a  lazy  hound,  and  married  the  daughter  of  the 
Romans,  whom  Odin  hates,  and  went  northward  again  to  Gaul,  did 
not  I  sing  you  all  the  song  of  Asgard  in  Messina  there,  till  you  swore 
to  follow  the  Amal  through  fire  and  water,  until  we  found  the  hall 
of  Odin,  and  received  the  mead-cup  from  his  own  hand?  Hear  it 
again,  warriors  of  the  Goths  !  ” 

“  Not  that  song  !  ”  roared  the  Amal,  stopping  his  ears  with  both 
his  hands.  ‘ '  Will  you  drive  us  blood-mad  again,  just  as  we  are 
settling  down  into  our  sober  senses,  and  finding  out  what  our  lives 
were  given  us  for  ?  ” 

“  Hear  the  song  of  Asgard  !  On  to  Asgard,  wolves  of  the  Goths  !  ” 
shouted  another  ;  and  a  babel  of  voices  arose. 

‘  ‘  Haven’t  we  been  fighting  and  marching  these  seven  years  ?  ” 

“  Haven’t  we  drank  blood  enough  to  satisfy  Odin  ten  times  over? 
If  he  wants  us,  let  him  come  himself  and  lead  us  !  ” 

“  Let  us  get  our  winds  again  before  we  start  afresh  !  ” 

“Wulf  the  Prince  is  like  his  name,  and  never  tires  ;  he  has  a 
winter- wolf’s  legs  under  him  ;  that  is  no  reason  why  we  should 
have.” 

“  Haven’t  you  heard  what  the  monk  says? — we  can  never  get  over 
those  cataracts.” 


44 


HYPATIA. 


We’ll  stop  his  old- wives’  tales  for  liim,  and  then  settle  for  our¬ 
selves,”  said  Smid  ;  and  springing  from  the  thwart  where  he  had 
been  sitting,  he  caught  up  a  bill  with  one  hand,  and  seized  Pliilain- 
mon’s  throat  with  the  other  ....  in  a  moment  more,  it  would  have 
been  all  over  with  him . 

For  the  first  time  in  his  life,  Philammon  felt  a  hostile  gripe  upon 
him,  and  a  new  sensation  rushed  through  every  nerve,  as  he  grappled 
with  the  warrior,  clutched  with  his  left  hand  the  uplifted  wrist,  and 
with  his  right  the  girdle,  and  commenced,  without  any  definite  aim, 
a  fierce  struggle,  which,  strange  to  say,  as  it  went  on,  grew  absolutely 
pleasant. 

The  women  shrieked  to  their  lovers  to  part  the  combatants,  but  in 
vain. 

“  Not  for  worlds  !  A  very  fair  match,  and  a  very  fair  fight  !  Take 
your  long  legs  back,  Itho,  or  they  will  be  over  you  !  That’s  right, 
my  Smid,  don’t  use  the  knife  !  They  will  be  overboard  in  a  moment  ! 
\y  all  the  Valkyrs,  they  are  down  !  and  Smid  undermost  !  ” 

There  was  no  doubt  of  it  ;  and  in  another  moment  Pliilammon 
vould  have  wrenched  the  bill  out  of  his  opponent’s  hand,  when,  to 
the  utter  astonishmeait  of  the  on-lookers,  he  suddenly  loosed  his  hold, 
shook  himself  free  by  one  powerful  wrench,  and  quietly  retreated  to 
his  seat,  conscience-stricken  at  the  fearful  thirst  for  blood  which  had 
suddenly  boiled  up  within  him  as  he  felt  his  enemy  under  him. 

The  on-lookers  were  struck  dumb  with  astonishment  ;  they  had 
taken  for  granted  that  he  would,  as  a  matter  of  course,  have  used  his 
right  of  splitting  his  vanquished  opponent’s  skull, — an  event  which 
they  would  of  course  have  deeply  deplored,  but  with  which,  as  men 
of  honor,  they  could  not  on  any  account  interfere,  but  merely  console 
themselves  for  the  loss  of  their  comrade  by  flaying  his  conqueror 
alive,  “  carving  him  into  the  blood-eagle,”  or  any  other  delicate  cere¬ 
mony  which  might  serve  as  a  vent  for  their  sorrow  and  a  comfort  to 
the  soul  of  the  deceased. 

Smid  rose,  with  the  bill  in  his  hand,  and  looked  round  him, — per¬ 
haps  to  see  what  was  expected  of  him.  He  half  lifted  his  weapon  to 

strike . Philammon,  seated,  looked  him  calmly  in  the  face . 

The  old  warrior’s  eye  caught  the  bank,  which  was  now  receding 
rapidly  past  them  ;  and  when  he  saw  that  they  were  really  floating 
downward  again,  without  an  effort  to  stem  the  stream,  he  put  away 
his  bill,  and  sat  himself  down  deliberately  in  his  place,  astonishing 
the  on-lookers  quite  as  much  as  Philammon  had  done, 

‘‘  Five  minutes’  good  fighting,  and  no  one  killed!  This  is  a  shame!” 
quoth  another.  “Blood  we  must  see,  and  it  had  better  be  yours, 
master  monk,  than  your  betters’,” — and  therewith  he  rushed  on  poor 
Philammon. 

He  spoke  the  heart  of  the  crew ;  the  sleeping  wolf  in  them  had 
been  awakened  by  the  struggle,  and  blood  they  would  have  ;  and  not 
frantically,  like  Celts  or  Egyptians,  but  with  th©  cool,  humorous 


'uj-Ji!  OOTHS. 


45 


cruelty  of  the  Teuton,  they  rose  altogether,  and  turning  Philammon 
over  on  his  back,  deliberated  by  what  death  he  should  die. 

Philammon  quietly  submitted, — if  submission  have  anything  to  do 
with  that  state  of  mind  in  which  sheer  astonishment  and  novelty 
have  broken  up  all  the  custom  of  man’s  nature,  till  the  strangest 
deeds  and  sufferings  are  taken  as  matters  of  course.  His  sudden 
escape  from  the  Laura,  the  new  world  of  thought  and  action  into 
which  he  had  been  plunged,  the  new  companions  with  whom  he  had 
fallen  in,  had  driven  him  utterly  from  his  moorings,  and  now  any¬ 
thing  and  everything  might  happen  to  him.  He  who  had  promised 
never  to  look  on  woman,  found  himself,  by  circumstances  over  which 
he  had  no  control,  amid  a  boatful  of  the  most  objectionable  species  of 
that  most  objectionable  genus, — and  the  utterly  worst  having  hap¬ 
pened,  everything  else  which  happened  must  be  better  than  the 
worst.  For  the  rest,  he  had  gone  forth  to  see  the  world, — and  this 
was  one  of  the  ways  of  it.  So  he  made  up  his  mind  to  see  it,  and  be 
filled  with  the  fruit  of  his  own  devices. 

And  he  would  have  been  certainly  filled  with  the  same  in  five 
minutes  more,  in  some  shape  too  ugly  to  be  mentioned  :  but  as  even 
sinful  women  have  hearts  in  them,  Pelagia  shrieked  out, — 

“  Amalric  !  Amalric  !  do  not  let  them  !  I  cannot  bear  it !  ” 

“  The  warriors  are  free  men,  my  darling,  and  know  what  is  proper. 
And  what  can  the  life  of  such  a  brute  be  to  you  ?  ” 

Before  he  could  stop  her,  Pelagia  had  sprung  from  her  cushions, 
and  thrown  herself  into  the  midst  of  the  laughing  ring  of  wild 
beasts. 

“  Spare  him  !  Spare  him  for  my  sake  !  ”  shrieked  she. 

“  O  my  pretty  lady  !  you  mustn’t  interrupt  warriors’  sport !” 

In  an  instant  she  had  torn  off  her  shawl  and  thrown  it  over  Phil¬ 
ammon  ;  and  as  she  stood,  with  all  the  outlines  of  her  beautiful 
limbs  revealed  through  the  thin  robe  of  spangled  gauze, — 

‘  ‘  Let  the  man  who  dares  touch  him  beneath  that  shawl  ? — though 
it  be  a  saffron  one  !  ” 

The  Goths  drew  back.  For  Pelagia  herself  they  had  as  little  re¬ 
spect  as  the  rest  of  the  world  had.  But  for  a  moment  she  was  not 
the  Messalina  of  Alexandria,  but  a  woman  ;  and  true  to  the  old 
woman-worshiping  instinct,  they  looked  one  and  all  at  her  flashing  ij 
eyes,  fnll  of  noble  pity  and  indignation,  as  well  as  cf  mere  woman’s  ' 
terror,  and  drew  back,  and  whispered  together. 

Whether  the  good  spirit  or  the  evil  one  would  conquer  seemed  for 
a  moment  doubtful,  when  Pelagia  felt  a  heavy  hand  on  her  shoulder, 
and,  turning,  saw  Wulf,  the  son  of  Ovida. 

“  Go  back,  pretty  woman  !  Men,  I  claim  the  boy.  Smid,  give  him 
to  me.  He  is  your  man.  You  could  have  killed  him  if  you  had 
chosen,  and  did  not  ;  *and  no  one  else  shall.” 

“  Give  him  us,  Prince  Wulf  !  We  have  not  seen  blood  for  many  a 
day  !  ” 


46 


HYPATIA. 


You  might  have  seen  rivers  of  it,  if  you  had  had  the  hearts  to  go 
onward.  The  boy  is  mine,  and  a  brave  boy.  He  has  upset  a  warrior 
fairly  this  day,  and  spared  him  ;  and  we  will  make  a  warrior  of  him 
in  return.” 

And  he  lifted  up  the  prostrate  monk. 

“  You  are  my  man  now.  Do  you  like  fighting?  ” 

Philammon,  not  understanding  the  language  in  which  he  was  ad¬ 
dressed,  could  only  shake  his  head, — though,  if  he  had  known  what 
its  import  was,  he  could  hardly  in  honesty  have  said,  No. 

“  He  shakes  his  head  !  He  does  not  like  it?  He  is  cravep  !  Let 
us  have  him  !  ” 

“  I  had  killed  kings  when  you  were  shooting  frogs,”  cried  Smid. 
“  Listen  to  me,  my  sons  !  A  coward  grips  sharply  at  first,  and  loosens 
his  hand  after  a  while,  because  his  blood  is  soon  hot  and  soon  cold. 
A  brave  man’s  gripe  grows  the  firmer  the  longer  he  holds,  because 
the  spirit  of  Odin  conies  upon  him.  I  watched  the  boy’s  hands  on 
my  throat,  and  he  will  make  a  man  ;  and  I  will  make  him  one.  How¬ 
ever,  we  may  as  well  make  him  useful  at  once,  so  give  him  an  oar.” 

‘'Well,”  answered  his  new  protector,  "he  can  as  well  row  us  as  be 
rowed  by  us  ;  and  if  we  are  to  go  back  to  a  cow’s  death  the  pool  of 
Hela,  the  quicker  we  go  the  better.” 

And  as  the  men  settled  themselves  again  to  their  oars,  one  was  put 
into  Philammon’s  hand,  which  he  managed  with  such  strength  and 
skill  that  his  late  tormentors,  who,  in  spite  of  an  occasional  inclina¬ 
tion  to  robbery  and  murder,  were  thoroughly  good-natured,  honest 
fellows,  clapped  him  on  the  back,  and  praised  him  as  heartily  as  they 
had  just  now  heartily  intended  to  torture  him  to  death,  and  then 
went  forward,  as  many  of  them  as  were  not  rowing,  to  examine  the 
strange  beast  which  they  had  just  slaughtered,  pawing  him  over 
from  tusks  to  tail,  putting  their  heads  into  his  mouth,  trying  their 
knives  on  his  hide,  comparing  him  to  all  beasts,  like  and  unlike, 
which  they  had  ever  seen,  and  laughing  and  shoving  each  other  about 
with  the  fun  and  childish  wonder  of  a  party  of  school-boys  ;  till 
Smid,  who  was  the  wit  of  the  party,  settled  the  comparative  anatomy 
of  the  subject  for  them  : — 

"  Valhalla  !  I’ve  found  out  what  he’s  most  like  ! — One  of  those  big 
blue  plums  which  gave  us  all  the  stomach-ache  when  we  were  en¬ 
camped  in  the  orchards  above  Ravenna  !  ” 


CHAPTER  IV. 


MIRIAM. 

One  morning  in  tlie  same  week,  Hypatia’s  favorite  maid  entered 
her  chamber  with  a  somewhat  terrified  face. 

“  The  old  Jewess,  madam, — the  hag  who  has  been  watching  so 
often  lately  under  the  wall  opposite.  She  frightened  us  all  out  of 
our  senses  last  evening  by  peeping  in.  We  all  said  she  had  the  evil 
eye,  if  any  one  ever  had - ” 

“  Well,  what  of  her?”  • 

“  She  is  below,  madam,  and  will  speak  with  you.  Not  that  I  care 
for  her  :  I  have  my  amulet  on.  I  hope  you  have?” 

“  Silly  girl !  Those  who  have  been  initiated  as  I  have  in  the  mys¬ 
teries  of  the  gods,  can  defy  spirits  and  command  them.  Do  you  sup¬ 
pose  that  the  favorite  of  Pallas  Athene  will  condescend  to  charms  and 
magic?  Send  her  up.” 

The  girl  retreated,  with  a  look  half  of  awe,  half  of  doubt  at  the 
lofty  pretensions  of  her  mistress,  and  returned  with  old  Miriam,  keep¬ 
ing,  however,  prudently  behind  her,  in  order  to  test  as  little  as  pos¬ 
sible  the  power  of  her  own  amulet  by  avoi^iing  the  basilisk  eye  which 
had  terrified  her. 

Miriam  came  in,  and,  advancing  to  the  proud  beauty,  who  remain¬ 
ed  seated,  made  an  obeisance  down  to  the  very  fioor,  without,  how¬ 
ever,  taking  her  eyes  for  an  instant  off  Hypatia’s  face. 

Her  countenance  was  haggard  and  bony,  with  broad,  sharp-cut  lips, 
stamped  with  a  strangly  mingled  expression  of  strength  and  sensuality. 
But  the  feature  about  her  which  instantly  fixed  Hypatia’s  attention, and 
from  which  she  could  not  in  spite  of  herself  withdraw  it,  was  the 
dry,  glittering,  coal-black  eye  which  glared  out  from  underneath  the 
gray  fringe  of  her  swarthy  brows,  between  black  locks  covered  with 
gold  coins.  Hypatia  could  look  at  nothing  but  those  eyes  ;  and  she 
reddened,  and  grew  all  but  unphilosophically  angry,  as  she  saw  that 
the  old  woman  intended  her  to  look  at  them,  and  feel  the  strange 
power  which  she  evidently  wished  them  to  exercise. 

After  a  moment’s  silence,  Miriam  drew  a  letter  from  her  bosom, 
and  with  a  second  low  obeisance  presented  it. 

‘  ‘  From  whom  is  this  ?  ” 

“  Perhaps  the  letter  itself  will  tell  the  beautiful  lady,  the  fortu¬ 
nate  lady,  the  discerning  lady,”  answered  she,  in  a  fawning,  wheedling 
tone.  “  How  should  a  poor  old  Jewess  know  great  folks’  secrets  ?  ” 

(47) 


48 


HYPATIA. 


**  Great  folks  ? - ” 

Hypatia  looked  at  the  seal  which  fixed  a  silk  cord  round  the  letter. 

It  was  Orestes’s ;  and  so  was  the  handwriting . Strange  that  he 

should  have  chosen  such  a  messenger  !  What  message  could  it  be 
which  required  such  secrecy  ? 

She  clapped  her  hands  for  the  maid.  “  Let  this  woman  wait  in  the 
anteroom.”  Miriam  glided  out  backwards,  bowing  as  she  went.  As 
Hypatia  looked  up  over  the  letter  to  see  whether  she  was  alone,  she 
caught  a  last  glance  of  that  eye  still  fixed  upon  her,  and  an  expres¬ 
sion  in  Miriam’s  face  which  made  her,  she  knew  not  why,  shudder 
and  turn  chill. 

“  Foolish  that  I  am  !  What  can  that  witch  be  tome?  But  now 
for  the  letter.” 

“  To  the  most  noble  and  most  beautiful,  the  mistress  of  philosophy, 
beloved  of  Athene,  her  pupil  and  slave  sends  greeting.”. . . . 

“  My  slave  !  and  no  name  mentioned  !  ” 

“  There  are  those  who  consider  that  the  favorite  hen  of  Honorius, 
which  bears  the  name  of  the  Imperial  City,  would  thrive  better  under 
a  new  feeder  ;  and  the  Count  of  Africa  has  been  despatched  by  him¬ 
self  and  by  the  immortal  gods  to  superintend  for  the  present  the 
poultry-yard  of  the  Caesars, — at  least  during  the  absence  of  Adolph 
and  Placidia.  There  are  those  also  who  consider  that  in  his  absence 
the  Numidian  lion  might  be  prevailed  on  to  become  the  yoke- fellow 
of  the  Egyptian  crocodile  ;  and  a  farm  which,  plowed  by  such  a  pair, 
should  extend  from  the  upper  cataract  to  the  pillars  of  Hercules, 
might  have  charms  even  for  a  philosopher.  But  while  the  plow¬ 
man  is  without  a  nymph,  Arcadia  is  imperfect.  What  were  Dionusos 
without  his  Ariadne,  Ares  without  Aphrodite,  Zeus  without  Here  ? 
Even  Artemis  has  her  Endymion  ;  Athene  alone  remains  unwedded  ; 
but  only  because  Hephaestus  was  too  rough  a  wooer  Such  is  not  he  who 
now  offers  to  the  representative  of  Athene  the  opportunity  of  sharing 
that  which  may  be  with  the  help  of  her  wisdom,  which  without  her 
is  impossible,  ^aordvra  6vy etoi6iv.  Shall  Eros,  invincible  for 
ages,  be  balked  at  last  of  the  noblest  game  against  which  he  ever  drew 
his  bow  ?”.... 

If  Hypatia’s  color  had  faded  a  moment  before  under  the  withering 
glance  of  the  old  Jewess,  it  rose  again  swiftly  enough,  as  she  read 
line  after  line  of  his  strange  epistle  ;  till  at  last,  crushing  it  together 
in  her  hand,  she  rose  and  hurried  into  the  adjoining  library,  where 
Theon  sat  over  his  books. 

“  Father  do  you  know  anything  of  this  ?  Look  what  Orestes  has 
dared  to  send  me  by  the  hands  of  some  base  Jewish  witch  !”  And 
she  spread  the  letter  before  him,  and  stood  impatient,  her  whole  figure 
dilated  with  pride  and  anger,  as  the  old  man  read  it  slowly  and  care¬ 
fully,  and  then  looked  up,  apparently  not  ill  pleased  with  the  contents. 

“  What,  father  ?”  asked  she,  half  reproachfully.  “  Do  not  you, 
too,  feel  the  insult  which  has  been  put  upon  your  daughter  ?” 


MIRIAM. 


49 


''  My  dear  child,”  with  a  puzzled  look,  “  do  you  not  see  that  he 
offers  you - ” 

“  I  know  what  he  offers  me,  father.  The  Empire  of  Africa . 

I  am  to  descend  from  the  mountain  heights  of  science,  from  the  con¬ 
templation  of  the  unchangeable  and  the  ineffable  glories,  into  the 
foul  fields  and  farm-jards  of  earthly  practical  life,  and  become  a 
drudge  among  political  chicanery,  and  the  petty  ambitions,  and  sins, 

and  falsehoods  of  the  earthly  herd . And  the  price  which  he  offers 

me, — me,  the  stainless, — me,  the  virgin — me,  the  untamed, — is — his 
hand  !  Pallas  Athene  !  dost  thou  not  blush  with  thy  child?  ” 

“But,  my  child, — my  child, — an  empire - ” 

“  Would  the  empire  of  the  world  restore  my  lost  self-respect, — ^my 
just  pride  ?  Would  it  save  my  cheek  from  blushes  every  time  I 
recollected  that  I  bore  the  hateful  and  degrading  name  of  wife? — 
The  property,  the  puppet  of  a  man, — submitting  to  his  pleasure, — 
bearing  his  children, — wearing  myself  out  with  all  the  nauseous  cares 
of  wifehood, — no  longer  able  to  glory  in  myself,  pure  and  self-sus¬ 
tained,  but  forced  by  day  and  night  to  recollect  that  my  very  beauty 
is  no  longer  the  sacrament  of  Athene’s  love  for  me,  but  the  plaything 
of  a  man  ; — and  such  a  man  as  that  !  Luxurious,  frivolous,  heart¬ 
less, — courting  my  society,  as  he  has  done  for  years,  only  to  pick  up 
and  turn  to  his  own  base,  earthly  uses  the  scraps  which  fall  from  the 
festal  table  of  the  gods  !  I  have  encouraged  him  too  much, — vain 
fool  that  I  have  been  !  No,  I  wrong  myself  !  it  was  only — I  thought 
— I  thought  that  by  his  being  seen  at  our  doors,  the  cause  of  the  im¬ 
mortal  gods  would  gain  honor  and  strength  in  the  eyes  of  the  multi¬ 
tude . I  have  tried  to  feed  the  altars  of  heaven  with  earthly  fuel. 

. . .  .And  this  is  my  just  reward  !  I  will  write  to  him  this  moment  ; 
— return,  by  the  fitting  messenger  which  he  has  sent,  insult  for  in¬ 
sult  !  ” 

“  In  the  name  of  Heaven,  my  daughter  ! — for  your  father’s  sake  ! 
— for  my  sake  !  Hypatia  ! — my  pride,  my  joy,  my  only  hope  ! — have 
pity  on  my  gray  hairs  1  ” 

And  the  poor  old  man  flung  himself  at  her  feet,  and  clasped  her 
knees  imploringly. 

’i’enderly  she  lifted  him  up,  and  wound  her  long  arms  round  him, 
Mid  laid  his  head  on  her  white  shoulder,  and  her  tears  fell  fast  upon 
his  gray  hair  :  but  her  lip  was  firm  and  determined. 

“  Think  of  my  pride, — my  glory  in  your  glory  ;  think  of  me.  Not 
for  myself  !  You  know  I  never  cared  for  myself  !  ”  sobbed  out  the 
old  man.  “  But  to  die  seeing  you  empress  !  ” 

“  Unless  I  died  fi-rst  in  childbed,  father,  as  many  a  woman  dies 
who  is  weak  enough  to  become  a  slave,  and  submit  to  tortures  only 
fit  for  slaves.” 

“  But — but — ”  said  the  old  man,  racking  his  bewildered  brains  for 
some  argument  far  enough  removed  from  nature  and  common  sense 
to  have  an  effect  on  the  beautiful  fanatic, — “but  the  cause  of  the 
gods  !  What  you  might  do  for  it  i  • .  .Remember  Julian  1  ” 


60 


HYPATIA. 


Hypatia’s  arms  dropped  suddenly.  Yes  ;  it  was  true  !  The  thought 

flashed  across  her  mind  with  mingled  delight  and  terror . Visions 

of  her  childhood  rose  swift  and  thick, — temples,  sacrifices,  priest¬ 
hoods,  colleges,  museums  !  What  might  she  not  do  ?  What  might 
she  not  make  Africa  ?  Give  her  ten  years  of  power,  and  the  hated 
name  of  Christian  might  he  forgotten,  and  Athene  Polias,  colossal  in 
ivory  and  gold,  watching  in  calm  triumph  over  the  harbors  of  a  hea¬ 
then  Alexandria . But  the  price  ! 

And  she  hid  her  face  in  her  hands,  and,  bursting  into  bitter  tears, 
walked  slowly  away  into  her  own  chamber,  her  whole  body  convulsed 
with  the  internal  struggle. 

The  old  man  looked  after  her,  anxiously  and  perplexed,  and  then 
followed,  hesitating.  She  was  sitting  at  the  table,  her  face  buried  in 
her  hands.  He  did  not  dare  to  disturb  her.  In  addition  to  all  the 
affection,  the  wisdom,  the  glorious  beauty,  on  which  his  old  heart 
fed  day  by  day,  he  believed  her  to  be  the  possessor  of  those  super¬ 
natural  powers  and  favors  to  which  she  so  boldly  laid  claim.  And  he 
stood  watching  her  in  the  doorway,  praying  in  his  heart  to  all  gods 
and  demons,  principalities  and  powers  from  Athene  down  to  his 
daughter’s  guardian  spirit,  to  move  a  determination  which  he  was  too 
weak  to  gainsay,  and  yet  too  rational  to  approve. 

At  last  the  struggle  was  over,  and  she  looked  up,  clear,  calm,  and 
glorious  again. 

‘  ‘  It  shal]  be.  For  the  sake  of  the  immortal  gods,- — for  the  sake  of 

art,  and  science,  and  learning,  and  philosophy . It  shall  be.  If 

the  gods  demand  a  victim,  here  am  I.  If  a  second  time  in  the  his¬ 
tory  of  the  ages  the  Grecian  fleet  cannot  sail  forth,  conquering  and  civil¬ 
izing,  without  the  sacrifice  of  a  virgin,  I  give  my  throat  to  the  knife. 
Father,  call  me  no  more  Hypatia :  call  me  Iphigenia  !  ” 

“  And  me  Agamemnon  ?  ”  asked  the  old  man,  attempting  a  faint 
jest  through  his  tears  of  joy.  ‘  ‘  I  dare  say  you  think  me  a  very  cruel 
father  ;  but - ” 

“  Spare  me,  father, — I  have  spared  you.” 

And  she  began  to  write  her  answer. 

“  I  have  accepted  his  offer, — conditionally,  that  is.  And  on  whether 

he  have  courage  or  not  to  fulfill  that  condition,  depends -  Do  not 

ask  me  what  it  is.  While  Cyril  is  leader  of  the  Christian  mob,  it 
may  be  safer  for  you,  my  father,  that  you  should  be  able  to  deny  all 
knowledge  of  my  answer.  Be  content.  I  have  said  this, — that  if 
he  will  do  as  you  would  have  him  do,  I  will  do  as  you  would  have  me 
do.” 

“  Have  you  not  been  too  rash  ?  Have  you  not  demanded  of  him 
something  which,  for  the  sake  of  public  opinion,  he  dare  not  grant 
openly,  and  yet  which  he  may  allow  you  to  do  for  yourself  when 
once - ” 

“  [  have.  If  I  am  to  be  a  victim,  the  sacrificing  priest  shall  at 
least  be  a  man,  and  not  a  coward  and  a  time-server.  If  he  believe 


MmiAM. 


61 


his  Christian  faith,  let  him  defend  it  against  me  ;  for  either  it  or  I 
shall  perish.  If  he  does  not, — as  he  does  not, — let  him  give  up  liv¬ 
ing  in  a  lie,  and  taking  on  his  lips  blasphemies  against  the  immortals, 
from  which  his  heart  and  reason  revolt  !  ” 

And  she  clapped  her  hands  again  for  the  maid-servant,  gave  her 
the  letter  silently,  shut  the  doors  of  her  chamber,  and  tried  to  resume 
her  Commentary  on  Plotinus.  Alas  !  what  were  all  the  wire-drawn 
dreams  of  metaphysics  to  her  in  that  real  and  human  struggle  of  the 
heart  ?  What  availed  it  to  define  the  process  by  which  individual 
souls  emanated  from  the  iiniversal  one,  while  her  own  soul  had, 
singly  and  on  its  own  responsibility,  to  decide  so  terrible  an  act  of 
will  ?  or  to  write  fine  words  with  pen  and  ink  about  the  immutability 
of  the  supreme  Keason,  while  her  own  reason  was  left  there  to 
Struggle  for  its  life  amid  a  roaring,  shoreless  waste  of  doubts  and 
darkness  ?  O,  how  grand,  and  clear,  and  logical  it  had  all  looked  half 
an  hour  ago  !  And  how  irrefragably  she  had  been  deducing  from  it 
all,  syllogism  after  syllogism,  the  non-existence  of  evil  ! — how  it  was 
but  a  lower  form  of  good,  one  of  the  countless  products  of  the  one 
great,  all-pervading  mind  which  could  not  err  or  change,  only  so 
strange  and  recondite  in  its  form  as  to  excite  antipathy  in  all  minds 
but  that  of  the  philosopher,  who  learned  to  see  the  stem  which  con¬ 
nected  the  apparently  bitter  fruit  with  the  perfect  root  from  whence 
it  sprung.  Could  she  see  the  stem  there  ? — the  connection  between 
the  pure  and  supreme  Reason,  and  the  hideous  caresses  of  the  de¬ 
bauched  and  cowardly  Orestes  ?  Was  not  that  evil,  pure,  unadulter¬ 
ate  with  any  vein  of  good,  past,  present,  or  future  ?  . . . . 

True  ; — she  might  keep  her  spirit  pure  amid  it  all  ;  she  might  sacri¬ 
fice  the  base  body,  and  ennoble  the  soul  by  the  self-sacrifice . And 

yet,  would  not  that  increase  the  horror,  the  agony,  the  evil  of  it, — 
to  her,  at  least,  most  real  evil,  not  to  be  explained  away, — and  yet  the 
gods  required  it?  Were  they  just,  merciful  in  that?  Was  it  like 
them,  to  torture  her,  their  last  unshaken  votary  ?  Did  they  require 
it?  Was  it  not  required  of  them  by  some  higher  power,  of  whom 
they  were  only  the  emanations,  the  tools,  the  puppets  ? — and  required 
of  that  higher  power  by  some  still  higher  one, — some  nameless,  abso¬ 
lute  destiny  of  which  Orestes  and  she,  and  all  heaven  and  earth, 
were  buftlie  victims,  dragged  along  in  an  inevitable  vortex,  helpless, 
hopeless,  toward  that  for  which  each  was  meant  ? — And  she  was 
meant  for  this  !  The  thought  was  unbearable  ;  it  turned  her  giddy. 
No  !  she  would  not  !  She  would  rebel  !  Like  Prometheus,  she 
would  dare  destiny,  and  brave  its  worst  !  And  she  sprang  up  to  re- 

call  the  letter . Miriam  was  gone  ;  and  she  threw  herself  on  the 

fioor  and  wept  bitterly. 

And  her  peace  of  mind  would  certainly  not  have  been  improved, 
could  she  have  seen  old  Miriam  hurry  home  with  her  letter  to  a  dingy 
house  in  the  Jews’  quarter,  where  it  was  unsealed,  read,  and  sealed 
up  again  with  such  marvelous  skill,  that  no  eye  could  have  detected 


62 


HYPATIA, 


the  change  ;  and  finally,  still  less  would  she  have  heen  comforted 
could  she  have  heard  the  conversation  which  was  going  on  in  a  sum¬ 
mer-room  of  Orestes’s  palace,  between  that  illustrious  statesman  and 
Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  who  were  lying  on  two  divans  opposite  each 
other,  whiling  away,  by  a  thro  w  or  two  of  dice,  the  anxious  moments 
which  delayed  her  answer. 

“  Trays  again  !  The  Devil  is  in  you,  Raphael  !” 

“  I  believe  he  is,”  answered  Raphael,  sweeping  up  the  gold 
pieces . 

“  When  will  that  old  witch  be  back  ?  ” 

“  When  she  has  read  through  your  letter  and  Hypatia’s  answer.” 

‘  ‘  Read  them  ?  ” 

Of  course.  You  don’t  fancy  she  is  going  to  be  fool  enough  to 
carry  a  message  without  knowing  what  it  is  ?  Don’t  be  angry  ;  she 
won’t  tell.  She  would  give  one  of  those  two  grave  lights  there, 
which  she  calls  her  eyes,  to  see  the  thing  prosper.” 

“  Why  ?  ” 

“  Your  excellency  will  know  when  the  letter  comes.  Here  she  is  ; 
I  hear  steps  in  the  cloister.  Now,  one  bet  before  they  enter.  I  give 
you  two  to  one  she  asks  you  to  turn  pagan.” 

“  What  in  ?  Negro- boys  ?  ” 

Anything  you  like.” 

“  Taken.  Come  in  slaves  !  ” 

And  Hypocorisma  entered,  pouting. 

That  Jewish  fury  is  outside  with  a  letter,  and  has  the  impudence 
to  say  she  won’t  let  me  bring  it  in  !  ” 

Bring  her  in  then.  Quick  !  ” 

I  wonder  what  I  ««m  here  for,  if  people  have  secrets  that  I  am 
not  to  know,”  grumbled  the  spoiled  youth. 

“  Do  you  want  a  blue  ribbon  round  those  white  sides  of  yours,  you 
monkey?”  answered  Orestes.  “Because,  if  you  do,  the  hippopota¬ 
mus-hide  hangs  ready  •utside.” 

“  Let  us  make  him  kneel  down  here  for  a  couple  of  hours  and  use 
him  as  a  dice-board,”  said  Raphael,  “  as  you  used  to  do  to  the  girls 
in  Armenia.” 

“  Ah,  you  recollect  that? — and/how  the  barbarian  papas  used  to 
grumble,  till  I  had  to  crucify  one  or  two,  eh  ?  That  was  something 
like  life  !  T  love  those  out-cf-the  way  stations,  where  nobody  asks 
questions  :  but  here  one  might  as  well  live  among  the  monks  in  Ni- 
tria.  Here  comes  Canidia  !  Ah,  the  answer  ?  Hand  it  here,  iny 
queen  of  go-betweens  !  ” 

Orestes  read  it, — and  his  countenance  fell. 

“  I  have  won  !  ” 

“  Out  of  Dhe  room,  slaves  !  and  no  listening  !  ” 

“  I  have  won,  then  ?  ” 

Orestes  tossed  the  letter  across  to  him,  and  Raphael  read  : — 

**  The  immortal  gods  accept  no  divided  worship  ;  and  he  who  would 


MfUIA  M. 


5B 


command  the  counsels  of  their  prophetess  must  remember  that  they 
will  vouchsafe  to  her  no  illumination  till  their  lost  honors  be  restored. 
If  he  who  aspires  to  be  the  lord  of  Africa  dare  trample  on  the  hateful 
cross,  and  restore  the  Csesareum  to  those  for  whose  worship  it  was 
built, — if  he  dare  proclaim  aloud  with  his  lips,  and  in  his  deeds,  that 
contempt  for  novel  and  barbarous  superstitions,  which  his  taste  and 
reason  have  already  taught  him,  then  he  would  prove  himself  one 
with  whom  it  were  a  glory  to  labor,  to  dare,  to  die  in  a  great  cause. 
But  till  then - ” 

And  so  the  letter  ended. 

“  What  am  I  to  do 
Take  her  at  her  word.’’ 

‘  ‘  Good  heavens  !  I  shall  be  excommunicated  !  And — and — what 
is  to  become  of  my  soul  ?  ” 

“  What  will  become  of  it  in  any  case,  my  most  excellent  lord  ?  ” 
answered  Raphael,  blandly. 

“  You  mean — I  know  what  you  cursed  Jews  think  will  happen  to 
every  one  but  yourselves.  But  what  would  the  world  say?  I  an 
apostate  !  And  in  the  face  of  Cyril  and  the  populace  1  I  daren’t  I 
tell  you  !  ” 

“No  one  asked  your  excellency  to  apostatize.” 

“  Why,  what  ?  What  did  you  say  just  now  ?  ” 

“  I  asked  you  to  promise.  It  will  not  be  the  first  time  that  prom¬ 
ises  before  marriage  have  not  exactly  coincided  with  performance 
afterwards.  ” 

“  I  daren’t, — that  is,  I  won’t  promise,  I  believe,  now,  this  is  some 
trap  of  your  Jewish  intrigue,  just  to  make  me  commit  myself 
against  those  Christians,  whom  you  hate.” 

“  I  assure  you,  I  despise  all  mankind  far  too  profoundly  to  hate 
them.  How  disinterested  my  advice  was  when  I  proposed  this  match 
to  you,  you  never  will  know ;  indeed,  it  would  be  boastful  in  me  to 
tell  you.  But  really  you  must  make  a  little  sacrifice  to  win  this 
foolish  girl.  With  all  the  depth  and  daring  of  her  intellect  to  help 
you,  you  might  be  a  match  for  Romans,  Byzantines,  and  Goths  at 
once.  And  as  for  beauty,  why,  there  is  one  dimple  inside  that  wrist, 
just  at  the  setting  on  of  the  sweet  little  hand,  worth  all  the  other 
flesh  and  blood  in  Alexandria.” 

“  By  Jove  !  you  admire  her  so  much,  I  suspect  you  must  be  in  love 
with  her  yourself.  Why  don’t  you  marry  her?  I’ll  make  you  my 
prime  minister,  and  then  we  shall  have  the  use  of  her  wits  without 
the  trouble  of  her  fancies.  By  the  twelve  gods  !  If  you  marry  her 
and  help  me.  Til  make  you  what  you  like  !  ” 

Raphael  rose,  and  bowed  to  the  earth. 

“  Your  serene  high-mightiness  overwhelms  me.  But  I  assure  you, 
that,  never  having  as  yet  cared  for  any  one’s  interest  but  my  own,  I 
could  not  be  expected,  at  my  time  of  life,  to  devote  myself  to  that 
of  another,  even  though  it  were  to  yours,” 


S4 


HYPATIA. 


‘  ‘  Candid  !  ’* 

**  Exactly  so  ;  and,  moreover,  whosoever  I  may  marry  will  be 
practically,  as  well  as  theoretically,  my  private  and  peculiar  prop¬ 
erty . You  comprehend  ?  ” 

“  Candid  again.” 

“Exactly  so;  and  waiving  the  third  argument,  that  she  probably 
might  not  choose  to  marry  me,  I  beg  to  remark,  that  it  would  not  be 
proper  to  allow  the  world  to  say  that  I„tlie  subject,  had  a  wiser  and 
fairer  wife  than  you,  the  ruler  ;  especially  a  wife  who  had  already 
refused  that  ruler’s  complimentary  offer.” 

“  By  Jove  !  and  she  has  refused  me  in  good  earnest !  I’ll  make 
her  repent  it  !  I  was  a  fool  to  ask  her  at  all !  What’s  the  use  of 
having  guards,  if  one  can’t  compel  what  one  wants  ?  If  fair  means 
can’t  do  it,  foul  shall  !  I’ll  send  for  her  this  moment  !  ” 

“  Most  illustrious  majesty,  it  will  not  succeed.  You  do  not  know 
that  woman’s  determination.  Scourges  and  red-hot  pincers  will  not 
shake  her  alive  ;  and  dead,  she  will  be  of  no  use  whatsoever  to  you, 
while  she  will  be  of  great  use  to  Cyril.” 

“  How  ?  ” 

“  He  will  be  most  happy  to  make  the  whole  story  a  handle  against 
you,  give  out  that  she  died  a  virgin  martyr,  in  defense  of  the  most 
holy  catholic  and  apostolic  faith,  get  miracles  worked  at  her  tomb, 
and  pull  your  palace  about  your  ears  on  the  strength  thereof.” 

‘  Cyril  will  hear  of  it  anyhow  :  that’s  another  dilemma  into  which 
you  have  brought  me,  you  intriguing  rascal  !  Why,  this  girl  will  be 
boasting  all  over  Alexandria  that  I  have  offered  her  marriage,  and 
that  she  has  done  herself  the  honor  to  refuse  me.” 

“  She  will  be  much  too  wise  to  do  anything  of  the  kind  ;  she  has 
sense  enough  to  know  that,  if  she  did  so,  you  would  inform  a 
Christian  populace  what  conditions  she  offered  you,  and,  with  all  her 
contempt  for  the  burden  of  the  flesh,  she  has  no  mind  to  be  lightened 
of  that  pretty  load  by  being  torn  in  pieces  by  Christian  monks  ;  a 
very  probable  ending  for  her  in  any  case,  as  she  herself,  in  her 
melancholy  moods,  confesses.’ 

“  What  will  you  have  me  to  do  then  ?  ” 

“  Simply  nothing.  Let  the  prophetic  spirit  go  out  of  her,  as  it 
will,  in  a  day  or  two,  and  then — I  know  nothing  of  human  nature,  if 
she  does  not  bate  a  little  of  her  own  price.  Depend  on  it,  for  all  her 
ineff abilities,  and  impassibilities,  and  all  the  rest  of  the  seventh- 
heaven  moonshine  at  which  we  play  here  in  Alexandria,  a  throne  is 
far  too  pretty  a  bait  for  even  Hypatia  the  Pythoness  to  refuse.  Leave 
well  alone  is  a  good  rule,  but  leave  ill  alone  is  a  better.  So  now  an¬ 
other  bet  before  we  part,  and  this  time  three  to  one.  Do  nothing 
either  way,  and  she  sends  to  you  of  her  own  accord  before  a  month 
is  out.  In  Caucasian  mules  ?  Done?  Be  it  so.” 

“  Well,  you  are  the  most  charming  counselor  for  a  poor  perplexed 
devil  of  a  prefect  !  If  I  had  but  a  private  fortune  like  you,  I  could 
just  take  the  money  and  let  the  work  do  itself.” 


MIRTAM. 


55 


**  Wliicli  is  tlie  true  metliod  of  successful  government.  Your 
slave  bids  you  farewell.  Do  not  forget  our  bet.  You  dine  witli  me 
to-morrow  ?  ” 

And  Raphael  bowed  himself  out. 

As  he  left  the  prefect’s  door,  he  saw  Miriam  on  the  opposite  side^ 
of  the  street,  evidently  watching  for  him.  As  soon  as  she  saw  him, 
she  held  on  her  own  side,  without  appearing  to  notice  him,  till  he 
turned  a  corner,  and  then,  crossing,  caught  him  eagerly  by  the  arm. 

“  Does  the  fool  dare  ?  ” 

“  Who  dare  what  ?” 

‘‘You  know  what  I  mean.  Do  you  suppose  old  Miriam  carries  let¬ 
ters  without  taking  care  to  know  what  is  inside  them  ?  Will  he 
apostatize?  Tell  me.  I  am  secret  as  the  grave  !  ” 

“The  fool  has  found  an  old  worm-eaten  rag  of  conscience  some¬ 
where  in  the  corner  of  his  heart,  and  dare  not.” 

“Curse  the  coward  !  And  such  a  plot  as  I  had  laid  !  I  would 
have  swept  every  Christian  dog  out  of  Africa  within  the  year.  What 
is  the  man  afraid  of  ?  ” 

“Hell-fire.” 

“  Why,  he  will  go  there  in  any  case,  the  accursed  Gentile  !  ” 

“  So  I  hinted  to  him,  as  delicately  as  I  could  ;  but,  like  the  rest 
of  the  world,  he  had  a  sort  of  partiality  for  getting  thither  by  his 
own  road.” 

“  Coward  I  And  whom  shall  I  get  now  !  Oh,  if  that  Pelagia  had 
as  much  cunning  in  her  whole  body  as  Hypatia  has  in  her  little 
finger,  I’d  seat  her  and  her  Goth  upon  the  throne  of  the  Caesars. 
But - ” 

“  But  she  has  five  senses,  and  just  enough  wit  to  use  them,  eh?” 

“Don’t  laugh  at  her  for  that,  the  darling!  I  do  delight  in  her, 
after  all.  It  warms  even  my  old  blood  to  see  how  thoroughly  she 
knows  her  business  and  how  she  enjoys  it,  like  a  true  daughter  of 
Eve.” 

“She  has  been  your  most  successful  pupil,  certainly,  mother. 
You  may  well  be  proud  of  her.” 

The  old  hag  chuckled  to  herself  awhile  ;  and  then  suddenly  turn¬ 
ing  to  Raphael  : — 

“See  here!  I  have  a  present  for  you;”  and  she  pulled  out  a 
magnificent  ring. 

“  Why,  mother,  you  are  always  giving  me  presents.  It  was  but  a 
month  ago  you  sent  me  this  poisoned  dagger.” 

“Why  not,  eh? — why  not?  Why  should  not  Jew  give  to  Jew? 
Take  the  old  woman’s  ring  !  ” 

What  a  glorious  opal  !  ” 

“  Ah,  that  is  an  opal,  indeed  !  And  the  unspeakable  name  upon 
it ;  just  like  Solomon’s  own.  Take  it,  I  say  !  Whosoever  wears  that 
need  never  fear  fire,  steel,  poison,  or  woman’s  eye.” 

“  Your  own  included,  eh  ?  ” 


56 


HYPATIA. 


Take  it,  I  say  !  ”  and  Miriam  cauglit  liis  hand,  and  forced  the 
ring  on  his  finger.  “  There  !  Now  you  are  safe.  And  now  call  me 
mother  again.  I  like  it.  I  don’t  know  why,  but  I  like  it.  And, 
Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  don’t  laugh  at  me,  and  call  me  witch  and  hag, 
as  you  often  do.  I  don’t  care  about  it  from  any  one  else  ;  I’m  accus¬ 
tomed  to  it.  But  when  you  do  it,  I  always  long  to  stab  you.  That’s 
why  I  gave  you  the  dagger.  I  used  to  wear  it  ;  and  I  was  afraid  I 
might  be  tempted  to  use  it  some  day,  when  the  thought  came  across 
me  how  handsome  you’d  look,  and  how  quiet,  when  you  were  dead, 
and  your  soul  up  there  so  happy  in  Abraham’s  bosom,  watching  all 
the  Gentiles  frying  and  roasting  forever  down  below.  Don’t  laugh 
at  me,  I  say  ;  and  don’t  thwart  me  !  I  may  make  you  the  emperor’s 
prime  minister,  some  day.  I  can  if  I  choose.” 

“  Heaven  forbid  !  ”  said  Raphael,  laughing. 

“Don’t  laugh.  I  cast  your  nativity  last  night,  and  I  know  you 
have  no  cause  to  laugh.  A  great  danger  hangs  over  you,  and  a  deep 
temptation.  And  if  you  weather  this  storm,  you  may  be  chamber- 
lain,  prime  minister,  emperor,  if  you  will.  And  you  shall  be, — by 
the  four  archangels,  you  shall  !  ” 

And  the  old  woman  vanished  down  a  by  lane,  leaving  Raphael 
utterly  bewildered. 

“  Moses  and  the  prophets  !  Does  the  old  lady  intend  to  marry  me? 
What  can  there  be  in  this  very  lazy  and  selfish  personage  who  bears 
my  name,  to  excite  so  romantic  an  affection?  Well,  Raphael  Abem 
Ezra,  thou  hast  one  more  friend  in  the  world  beside  Bran  the  mas' 
tiff ;  and  therefore  one  more  trouble,  seeing  that  friends  always  ex¬ 
pect  a  due  return  of  affection  and  good  offices,  and  what  not.  J 
wonder  whether  the  old  lady  has  been  getting  into  a  scrape  kidnap¬ 
ping,  and  wants  my  patronage  to  help  her  out  of  it . Three-quar¬ 

ters  of  a  mile  of  roasting  sun  between  me  and  home  !....!  must  hire 
a  gig,  or  a  litter,  or  something,  off  the  next  stand. . .  .with  a  driver 

who  has  been  eating  onions . And  of  course  there  is  not  a  stand  for 

the  next  half  mile.  O  divine  aether  !  as  Prometheus  has  it,  and  ye 
swift- winged  breezes  (I  wish  there  were  any  here),  when  will  it  all 
be  over?  Three-and-thirty  years  have  I  endured  already,  of  this 
Babel  of  knaves  and  fools  ;  and  with  this  abominable  good  health  of 
mine,  which  won’t  even  help  me  with  gout  or  indigestion,  lam  likely 

to  have  three-and-thirty  years  more  of  it . I  know  nothing,  and  I 

care  for  nothing,  and  I  expect  nothing  ;  and  I  actually  can’t  take  the 
trouble  to  prick  a  hole  in  myself,  and  let  the  very  small  amount  of 
wits  out,  to  see  something  really  worth  seeing,  and  try  its  strength  at 
something  really  worth  doing,  if,  after  all,  the  other  side  of  the  graye 

does  not  turn  out  to  be  just  as  stupid  as  this  one . "When  will  it*t)e 

all  over,  and  I  in  Abraham’s  bosom,  —or  any  one  else’s,  provided  it  be 
not  a  woman’s  ?  ” 

/  V 


CHAPTER  V. 


A  DAY  IN  ALEXANDRIA. 

In  the  meanwhile,  Philammon,  with  his  hosts,  the  Goths,  had 
been  slipping  down  the  stream.  Passing,  one  after  another,  world- 
old  cities  now  dwindled  to  decaying  towns,  and  numberless  canal- 
mouths,  now  fast  falling  into  ruin  with  the  fields  to  which  they  insured 
fertility,  under  the  pressure  of  Roman  extortion  and  misrule,  they 
had  entered  one  evening  the  mouth  of  the  great  canal  of  Alexandria, 
slid  easily  all  night  across  the  star-bespangled  shadows  of  Lake 
Mareotis,  and  found  themselves,  when  the  next  morning  dawned, 
among  the  countless  masts  and  noisy  quays  of  the  greatest  seaport  in 
the  world.  The  motley  crowd  of  foreigners,  the  hubbub  of  all  dia¬ 
lects  from  the  Crimea  to  Cadiz,  the  vast  piles  of  merchandise,  and 
heaps  of  wheat,  lying  unsheltered  in  that  rainless  air,  the  huge  bulk 
of  the  corn-ships  lading  for  Rome,  whose  tall  sides  rose  story  over 
story,  like  floating  palaces,  above  the  buildings  of  some  inner  dock, — 
these  sights,  and  a  hundred  more,  made  the  young  monk  think  that 
the  world  did  not  look  at  first  sight  a  thing  to  be  despised.  In  front 
of  heaps  of  fruit,  fresh  from  the  market-boats,  black  groups  of  glossy 
negro  slaves  were  basking  and  laughing  on  the  quay,  looking 
anxiously  and  coquettishly  round  in  hopes  of  a  purchaser  ;  they  evi¬ 
dently  did  not  think  the  change  from  desert  toil  to  city  luxuries  a 
change  for  the  worse  ;  Philammon  turned  away  his  eyes  from  be¬ 
holding  vanity  ;  but  only  to  meet  fresh  vanity  wheresoever  they  fell. 
He  felt  crushed  by  the  multitude  of  new  objects,  stunned  by  the  din 
around,  and  scarcely  recollected  himself  enough  to  seize  the  first  op¬ 
portunity  of  escaping  from  his  dangerous  companions. 

“  Holloa  !”  roared  Smid-  xie  armorer,  as  he  scrambled  on  to  the 
steps  of  the  slip  ;  “  you  are  not  going  to  run  away  without  bidding 
us  good-by?” 

“  Stop  with  me,  boy  1  ”  said  old  Wulf.  “  I  saved  you,  and  you 
are  my  man.” 

Philammon  turned  and  hesitated. 

“  I  am  a  monk,  and  God’s  man.” 

“  You  can  be  that  anywhere.  I  will  make  you  a  warrior.” 

“  The  weapons  of  my  warfare  are  not  of  flesh  and  blood,  but  prayer 
and  fasting,”  answered  poor  Philammon,  who  felt  already  that  he 
should  have  ten  times  more  need  of  the  said  weapons  in  Alexandria 

than  ever  he  had  had  in  the  desert . “Let  me  go  !  I  am  not 

(57) 


58 


HYPATIA. 


made  for  your  life!  I  tliank  you,  bless  you  !  I  will  pray  for  you,  sir! 
but  let  me  go  I  ” 

‘‘Curse  the  craven  hound  I”  roared  half  a  dozen  voices.  “  Why 
did  you  not  let  us  have  our  will  with  him,  Prince  Wulf  ?  You  might 
have  expected  such  gratitude  from  a  monk.” 

“  He  owes  me  my  share  of  the  sport,”  quoth  Smid.  “And  here  it 
is  !  ”  And  a  hatchet,  thrown  with  practiced  aim,  whistled  right  for 
Pliilammon’s  head.  He  had  just  time  to  swerve,  and  the  weapon 
struck  and  snapped  against  the  granite  wall  behind. 

“  Well  saved  I  ”  said  Wulf,  coolly,  while  the  sailors  and  market- 
women  above  yelled  murder,  and  the  custom-house  officers,  and  other 
constables  and  catchpoles  of  the  harbor,  rushed  to  the  place,  and  re¬ 
tired  again  quietly  at  the  thunder  of  the  Amal  from  the  boat’s 
stern  : — 

“  Never  mind  !  my  good  fellows  !  we’re  only  Goths,  and  on  a  visit  to 
the  prefect,  too.” 

“  Only  Goths,  my  donkey-riding  friends  !  ”  echoed  Smid  ;  and  at 
that  ominous  name  the  whole  posse  comitatus  tried  to  look  uncon¬ 
cerned,  and  found  suddenly  that  their  presence  was  absolutely  re¬ 
quired  in  an  opposite  direction. 

‘  ‘  Let  him  go,”  said  Wulf,  as  he  stalked  up  the  steps.  “  Let  the 
boy  go.  I  never  set  my  heart  on  any  man  yet,”  he  growled  to  him¬ 
self,  in  an  under  voice,  “  but  what  he  disappointed  me, — and  I  must 
not  expect  more  from  this  fellow  I  Come,  men,  ashore,  and  get 
drunk  !  ” 

Philammon,  of  course,  now  that  he  had  leave  to  go,  longed  to  stay  ; 
at  all  events  he  must  go  back  and  thank  his  hosts.  He  turned  un¬ 
willingly  to  do  so,  as  hastily  as  he  could,  and  found  Pelagia  and  her 
gigantic  lover  just  entering  a  palanquin.  With  downcast  eyes  he  ap¬ 
proached  the  beautiful  basilisk,  and  stammered  out  some  common¬ 
place  ;  and  she,  full  of  smiles,  turned  to  him  at  once. 

“  Tell  us  more  about  yourself  before  we  part.  You  speak  such 
beautiful  Greek, — true  Athenian.  It  is  quite  delightful  to  hear  one’s 
own  accent  again.  Were  you  ever  at  Athens?” 

“  When  I  was  a  child;  I  recollect — that  is,  I  think - ” 

“  What  ?  ”  asked  Pelagia,  eagerly. 

“  A  great  house  in  Athens — and  a  great  battle  there — and  coming 
to  Egypt  in  a  ship.” 

“  Heavens  !”  said  Pelagia,  and  paused . “How  strange!  Girls, 

who  said  he  was  like  me  ?  ” 

“  I’m  sure  we  meant  no  harm,  if  we  did  say  it  in  joke,”  pouted  one 
of  the  attendants. 

“  Like  me  ! —  you  must  come  and  see  us.  I  have  something  to 
say  to  you . You  must  !  ” 

Philammon  misinterpreted  the  intense  interest  of  her  tone,  and,  if 
he  did  not  shrink  back,  gave  some  involuntary  gesture  of  reluctance, 
Pelagia  laughed  aloud. 


A  DAY  m  ALEXANDRIA. 


59 


**  Don’t  be  vain  enough  to  suspect,  foolish  boy,  but  come  !  Do  you 
think  that  I  have  nothing  to  talk  about  but  nonsense  ?  Come  and  see 

me  ;  It  may  be  better  for  you  ;  I  live  in - ,”  and  she  named  a 

fashionable  street,  which  Philammon,  though  he  inwardly  vowed  not 
to  accept  the  invitation,  somehow  could  not  help  remembering. 

Do  leave  the  wild  man  and  come,”  growled  the  Amal  from  within 
the  palanquin.  “  You  are  not  going  to  turn  nun,  I  hope  ?  ” 

“Not  while  the  first  man  I  ever  met  in  the  world  stays  in  it,”  an¬ 
swered  Pelagia,  as  she  skipped  into  the  palanquin,  taking  care  to  show 
the  mo^t  lovely  wliite  heel  and  ankle,  and  like  the  Parthian,  send  a 
random  arrow  as  she  retreated.  But  the  dart  was  lost  on  Philam¬ 
mon,  who  had  been  already  hustled  away  by  the  bevy  of  laughing  at¬ 
tendants,  amid  baskets,  dressing-cases,  and  bird-cages,  and  was  fain 
to  make  his  escape  into  the  Babel  round,  and  inquire  his  way  to  the 
patriarch’s  house. 

“  Patriarch’s  house?”  answered  the  man  whom  he  first  addressed, 
a  little  lean,  swarthy  fellow,  with  merry  black  eyes,  who,  with  a 
basket  of  fruit  at  his  feet,  was  sunning  himself  on  a  balk  of  timber, 
meditatively  chewing  the  papyrus-cane,  and  examining  the  strangers 
with  a  look  of  absurd  sagacity.  “I  know  it;  without  a  doubt  I. 
know  it ;  all  Alexandria  has  good  reason  to  know  it.  Are  you  a 
monk  ?  ” 

“Yes.” 

“  Then  ask  your  way  of  the  monks;  j'ou  won’t  go  far  without  find¬ 
ing  one.” 

“  But  I  do  not  even  know  the  right  direction  :  what  is  your  grudge 
against  monks,  my  good  man  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  Look  here,  my  youth  ;  you  seem  too  ingenuous  for  a  monk. 
Don’t  flatter  yourself  that  it  will  last.  If  you  can  wear  the  sheep¬ 
skin,  and  haunt  the  churches  here  for  a  month,  without  learning  to 
lie,  and  slander,  and  clap,  and  hoot,  and  perhaps  play  your  part  in  a 
sedition-and-murder  satyric  drama, — why,  you  are  a  better  man  than 
I  take  you  for.  I,  sir,  am  a  Greek,  and  a  philosopher  ;  though  the 
whirlpool  of  matter  may  have,  and  indeed  has,  involved  my  ethereal 
spark  in  the  body  of  a  porter.  Therefore,  youth,”  continued  the 
little  man,  starting  up  upon  his  balk  like  an  excited  monkey,  and 
stretching  out  one  oratorio  paw,  ‘  ‘  I  bear  a  treble  hatred  to  the  monk 
ish  tribe.  First,  as  a  man  and  a  husband  ;  .  . .  .  for  as  for  the  smiles 
of  beauty,  or  otherwise, — such  as  I  have,  I  have  ;  and  the  monks,  if 
they  had  their  wicked  will,  would  leave  neither  men  nor  women  in 
the  world.  Sir,  they  would  exterminate  the  human  race  in  a  single 
generation,  by  a  voluntary  suicide  !  Secondly,  as  a  porter  ;  for  if  all 
men  turned  monks,  nobody  would  be  idle,  and  the  profession  of  por- 
tering  would  be  annihilated.  Thirdly,  sir,  as  a  philosopher  ;  for  as 
the  false  coin  is  odious  to  the  true,  so  is  the  irrational  and  animal  as¬ 
ceticism  of  the  monk  to  the  logical  and  methodic  self-restraint  of 
one  who,  likeydir  humblest  of  philosophers,  aspires  to  a  life  accord¬ 
ing  to  the  pure  reason.” 


60 


IITPATIA. 


*‘And  pray,”  asked  Pliilammon,  half  laughing,  “who  has  been 
your  tutor  in  philosophy  ?  ” 

“  The  fountain  of  classic  wisdom,  Hypatia  herself.  As  the  an¬ 
cient  sage — the  name  is  unimportant  to  a  monk — pumped  water 
nightly  that  he  might  study  by  day,  so  I,  the  guardian  of  cloaks  and 
parasols  at  the  sacred  doors  of  her  lecture-room,  imbibe  celestial 
knowledge.  From  my  youth,  I  felt  in  me  a  soul  above  the  matter¬ 
entangled  herd.  She  revealed  to  me  the  glorious  fact  that  I  am  a 
spark  of  Divinity  itself.  A  fallen  star,  I  am,  sir  !  ”  continued  he, 
pensively,  stroking  his  lean  stomach, —  “  a  fallen  star  ! — fallen,  if:  the 
dignity  of  philosophy  will  allow  of  the  simile,  among  the  ho^'s  of  tlie 
lower  world, — indeed,  into  the  hog-bucket  itself.  Well,  after  all,  1 
will  show  you  the  way  to  the  archbishop’s.  There  is  a  philosophic 
pleasure  in  opening  one’s  treasures  to  the  modest  young.  Perhaps 
you  will  assist  me  by  carrying  this  basket  of  fruit  !  ”  And  the  little 
man  jumped  up,  put  his  basket  on  Philammon’s  head,  and  trotted  off 
up  a  neighboring  street. 

Philammon  followed,  half  contemptuous,  half  wondering  at  what 
this  philosophy  might  be,  which  could  feed  the  self-conceit  of  any¬ 
thing  so  abject  as  his  ragged  little  apish  guide  ;  but  the  novel  roar 
and  whirl  of  the  street,  the  perpetual  stream  of  busy  faces,  the  line 
of  curricles,  palanquins,  laden  asses,  camels,  elephants,  which  met 
and  passed  him,  and  squeezed  him  up  steps  and  into  doorways,  as 
they  threaded  their  way  through  the  great  Moon-gate  into  the  ample 
street  beyond,  drove  everything  from  his  mind  but  wondering  curios¬ 
ity,  and  a  vague,  helpless  dread  of  that  great  living  wilderness, 
more  terrible  than  any  dead  wilderness  of  sand  which  he  had  left 
behind.  Already  he  longed  for  the  repose,  the  silence  of  the  Laura, 
— for  faces  which  knew  him  and  smiled  upon  him  ;  but  it  was  too 
late  to  turn  back  now.  His  guide  held  on  for  more  than  a  mile 
up  the  great  main  street,  crossed  in  the  center  of  the  city,  at  right 
angles,  by  one  equally  magnificent,  at  each  end  of  which,  miles  away, 
appeared,  dim  and  distant  over  the  heads  of  the  living  stream  of  pas¬ 
sengers,  the  yellow  sand-hills  of  the  desert  ;  while  at  the  end  of  the 
vista  in  front  of  them  gleamed  the  blue  harbor,  through  a  network 
of  countless  masts. 

At  last  they  reached  the  quay  at  the  opposite  end  of  the  street ;  and 
there  burst  on  Philammon’s  astonished  eyes  a  vast  semicircle  of 
blue  sea,  ringed  with  palaces  and  towers . He  stopped  involun¬ 

tarily  ;  and  his  little  guide  stopped  also,  and  looked  askance  at  the 
young  monk,  to  watch  the  effect  which  that  grand  panorama  should 
produce  on  him. 

“There! - Behold  our  works!  Us  Greeks! — us  benighted 

heathens  !  Look  at  it  and  feel  yourself  what  you  are,  a  very  small, 
conceited,  ignorant  young  person,  who  fancies  that  your  new  religion 
gives  you  a  right  to  despise  every  one  else.  Did  Christians  make  all 
this.  Did  Christians  build  that  Pharos  there  on  tha^left  horn, — won- 


A  DAF  I]\r  ALEXANDRIA. 


61 


der  of  the  world  ?  Did  Christians  raise  that  mile-long  mole  which 
runs  towards  the  land,  with  its  two  draw-bridges,  connecting  the  two 
ports  ?  Did  Christians  build  this  esplanade,  or  this  gate  of  the  Sun 
above  our  heads  ?  Or  that  Caesareum  on  our  right  here  ?  Look  at 
tliose  obelisks  before  it !  ”  And  he  pointed  upward  to  those  two  world- 
famous  ones,  one  of  which  still  lies  on  its  ancient  site,  as  Cleopatra’s 
needle.  “  Look  up  !  look  up,  I  say,  and  feel  small, — very  small  in¬ 
deed  !  Did  Christians  raise  them,  or  engrave  them  from  base  to  point 
with  the  wisdom  of  the  ancients  ?  Did  Christians  build  that  Museum 
nex4  to  it,  or  design  its  statues  and  its  frescoes, — now,  alas  !  re-echo¬ 
ing  no  more  to  the  hummings  of  the  Attic  bee  ?  Did  they  pile  up  out 
of  the  waves  that  palace  beyond  it,  or  that  Exchange  ?  or  fill  that 
Temple  of  Neptune  with  breathing  brass  and  blushing  marble  ?  Did 
they  build  that  Timonium  on  the  point,  where  Antony,  worsted  at 
Actium,  forgot  his  shame  in  Cleopatra’s  arms  ?  Did  they  quarry  out 
that  island  of  Antirrhodus  into  a  nest  of  docks,  or  cover  those  waters 
with  the  sails  of  every  nation  under  heaven  ?  Speak  !  thou  son  of 
bats  and  moles, — thou  six  feet  of  sand, — thou  mummy  out  of  the  cliff 
caverns  !  Can  monks  do  works  like  these  ?  ” 

“  Other  men  have  labored,  and  we  have  entered  into  their  labors,” 
answered  Philammon,  trying  to  seem  as  unconcerned  as  he  could. 
He  was  indeed  too  utterly  astonishea  to  be  angry  at  anything.  The 
overwhelming  vastness,  multiplicity,  and  magnificence  of  the  whole 
scene  ;  the  range  of  buildings,  such  as  mother  Earth  never,  perhaps, 
carried  on  her  lap  before  or  since  ;  the  extraordinary  variety  of  form, 
— the  pure  Doric  and  Ionic  of  tlie^ earlier  Ptolemies,  the  barbaric  and 
confused  gorgeousness  of  the  later  Roman,  and  here  and  there  an 
imitation  of  the  grand  elephantine  style  of  old  Egypt,  its  gaudy  colors 
relieving,  while  they  deepened,  the  effect  of  its  massive  and  simple 
outlines  ;  the  eternal  repose  of  that  great  belt  of  stone,  contrasting 
with  the  restless  ripple  of  the  glittering  harbor,  and  the  busy  sails 
which  crowded  out  into  the  sea  beyond,  like  white  doves  taking  their 
flight  into  boundless  space  ; — all  dazzled,  overpowered,  saddened 

him . This  was  the  world . Was  it  not  beautiful . Must  not 

the  men  who  made  all  this  have  been — if  not  great. . .  .yet. . .  .he 
knew  not  what?  Surely  they  had  great  souls  and  noble  thoughts  in 
them  !  Surely  there  was  something  godlike  in  being  able  to  create 
such  things  !  Not  for  themselves  alone,  too  ;  but  for  a  nation, — for 

generations  yet  unborn . And  there  was  the  sea. . .  .and  beyond  it 

nations  of  men  innumerable . His  imagination  was  dizzy  with 

thinking  of  them . Were  they  all  doomed, — lost  ?. . .  .Had  God  no 

love  for  them  ? 

At  last,  recovering  himself,  he  recollected  his  errand,  and  again 
asked  his  way  to  the  archbishop’s  house. 

“  This  way,  O  youthful  nonentity  !  ”  answered  the  little  man,  lead¬ 
ing  the  way  round  the  great  front  of  the  C^esareum,  at  the  foot  of 
the  obelisks. 


63 


HYPATIA. 


Philammon’s  eye  fell  on  some  new  masonry  in  tlie  pediment,  orna* 
mented  with  Christian  symbols. 

“  How  ?  Is  this  a  church  ?  ” 

“  It  is  the  Csesareum.  It  has  become  temporarily  a  church.  The 
immortal  gods  have,  for  the  time  being,  condescended  to  waive  their 
rights  ;  but  it  is  the  Ceesareum,  nevertheless.  This  way  :  down  this 
street  to  the  right.  There,”  said  he,  pointing  to  a  doorway  in  the 
side  of  the  Museum,  ‘  ‘  is  the  last  haunt  of  the  Muses, — the  lecture- 

room  of  Hypatia,  the  school  of  my  unworthiness . And  here,” 

stopping  at  the  door  of  a  splendid  house  on  the  opposite  side  of  the 
street,  “is  the  residence  of  that  blest  favorite  of  Athene, — Neith,  as 
the  barbarians  of  Egypt  would  denominate  the  goddess  ; — we  men  of 

Macedonia  retain  the  time-honored  Grecian  nomenclature . You 

may  put  down  your  basket.”  And  he  knocked  at  the  door,  and,  de¬ 
livering  the  fruit  to  a  black  porter,  made  a  polite  obeisance  to  Phil- 
ammon,  and  seemed  on  the  point  of  taking  his  departure. 

“  But  where  is  the  archbishop’s  house  ?” 

“Close  to  the  Serapeium.  You  cannot  miss  the  place  :  four  hun¬ 
dred  columns  of  marble,  now  ruined  by  Christian  persecutors,  stand 
on  an  eminence - ” 

“  But  how  far  ofi?  ” 

“  About  three  miles  ;  near  the  gate  of  the  Moon.” 

“  Why,  was  not  that  the  gate  by  which  we  entered  the  city  on  the 
other  side  ?  ” 

“  Exactly  so  ;  you  will  know  your  way  back,  having  already  trav¬ 
ersed  it.” 

Philammon  checked  a  decidedly  carnal  inclination  to  seize  the  little 
fellow  by  the  throat,  and  knock  his  head  against  the  wall,  and  con¬ 
tented  himself  by  saying, — 

“  Then  do  you  actually  mean  to  say,  you  heathen  villain,  that  you 
have  taken  me  six  or  seven  miles  out  of  my  road  ?  ” 

“Good  words,  young  mam  If  you  do  me  harm,  I  call  for  help  ; 
we  are  close  to  the  Jews’  quarter,  and  there  are  some  thousands  there 
who  will  swarm  out  like  wasps  on  the  chance  of  beating  a  monk  to 
death.  Yet  that  which  I  have  done,  I  have  done  with  good  purpose. 
First,  politically,  or  according  to  practical  wisdom, — in  order  that 
you,  not  I,  might  carry  the  basket.  Next,  philosophically,  or  accord¬ 
ing  to  the  intuitions  of  pure  reason, — in  order  that  you  might,  by  be¬ 
holding  the  magnificence  of  that  great  civilization  which  your  fellows 
wish  to  destroy,  learn  that  you  are  an  ass,  and  a  tortoise,  and  a  non¬ 
entity  ;  and  so,  beholding  yourself  to  be  nothing,  may  be  moved  to 
become  something.” 

And  he  moved  off. 

Philammon  seized  him  by  the  collar  of  his  ragged  tunic,  and  held 
him  in  a  grip  from  which  the  little  man,  though  he  twisted  like  an 
eel,  could  not  escape. 

“Peaceably  if  you  will;  if  not,  by  main  force.  You  shall  go 


A  DAY  m  ALEXANDRIA.  63 

back  with  me,  and  show  me  every  step  of  the  way.  It  is  a  just 
penalty.” 

“  The  philosopher  conquers  circumstances  by  submitting  to  them. 
I  go  peaceably.  Indeed,  the  base  necessities  of  the  hog-bucket  side 
of  existence  compel  me  of  themselves  back  to  the  Moon-gate,  for 
another  early  fruit  job.” 

So  they  went  back  together. 

Now  why,  Pliilammon’s  thoughts  should  have  been  running  on  the 
next  new  specimen  of  womankind  to  whom  he  had  been  introduced, 
tliough  only  in  name,  let  psychologists  tell,  but  certainly,  after  he 
had  walked  some  half-mile  in  silence,  he  suddenly  woke  up,  as  out  of 
many  meditations,  and  asked, — 

“I3ut  who  is  this  Hypatia,  of  whom  you  talk  so  much?” 

“Who  is  Hypatia,  rustic?  The  Queen  of  Alexandria!  In  wit, 
Athene  ;  Hera  in  majesty  ;  in  beauty,  Aphrodite  1  ” 

‘  ‘  And  who  are  they  ?  ”  asked  Philammon. 

The  porter  stopped,  surveyed  him  slowly  from  foot  to  head  with 
an  expression  of  boundless  pity  and  contempt,  and  was  in  the  act  of 
walking  off  in  the  ecstasy  of  his  disdain,  when  he  was  brought  to 
suddenly  by  Philammon’s  strong  arm. 

“  Ah  ! — I  recollect.  There  is  a  compact . Who  is  Athene  ?  The 

goddess,  giver  of  wisdom.  Hera,  spouse  of  Zeus,  Queen  of  the 
Celestials.  Aphrodite,  mother  of  love.  .  .  .  .You  are  not  expected 
to  understand.” 

Philammon  did  understand,  however,  so  much  as  this,  that  Hy¬ 
patia  was  a  very  unique  and  wonderful  person  in  the  mind  of  his 
little  guide  ;  and  therefore  asked  the  only  further  question  by  which 
he  could  as  yet  test  any  Alexandrian  phenomenon, — 

“  And  is  she  a  friend  of  the  patriarch  ?” 

The  porter  opened  his  eyes  very  wide,  put  his  middle  finger  in  a 
careful  and  complicated  fashion  between  his  fore  and  third  finger, 
and  extending  it  playfully  toward  Philammon,  performed  therewith 
certain  mysterious  signals,  the  effect  whereof  being  totally  lost 
on  him,  the  little  man  stopped,  took  another  look  at  Philammon’s 
stately  figure,  and  answered  : — 

“Of  tlie  human  race  in  general,  my  young  friend.  The  philoso¬ 
pher  must  rise  above  the  individual,  to  the  contemplation  of  the  uni¬ 
versal . Aha  1 — here  is  something  worth  seeing,  and  the  gates  are 

open.”  And  he  stopped  at  the  portal  of  a  vast  building. 

“  Is  this  the  patriarch’s  house?  ” 

“  The  patriarch’s  tastes  are  more  plebeian.  He  lives,  they  say,  in 
two  dirty  little  rooms, — knowing  what  is  fit  for  him.  The  patriarch’s 
house?  Its  antipodes,  my  young  friend, — that  is,  if  such  beings 
have  a  cosmic  existence,  on  which  point  Hypatia  has  her  doubts. 
This  is  the  temple  of  art  and  beauty ;  the  Delphic  tripod  of  poetic 
inspiration  ;  the  solace  of  the  earth-worn  drudge  ;  in  a  word,  the 
theater  ;  which  your  patriarch,  if  he  could,  would  convert  to  morrow 


64 


HYPATIA. 


into  a - but  tlie  piiilosoplier  must  not  revile.  All  !  I  see  tlie  pre¬ 

fect’s  apparitors  at  the  gate.  He  is  making  tlie  polity,  as  we  call  it 
here  ;  the  dispositions  ;  settling,  in  short,  the  bill  of  fare  for  the  day, 
in  compliance  with  the  public  palate,  A  facetious  pantomime  dances 
here  on  this  day  every  week, — admired  by  some,  the  Jews  especially. 
To  the  more  classic  taste,  many  of  his  movements — his  recoil,  espe¬ 
cially — are  wanting  in  the  true  aaitique  severity  ;  might  be  called, 
perhaps,  on  the  whole,  indecent.  Still  the  weary  pilgrims  must  be 
amused.  Let  us  step  in  and  hear.” 

But  before  Philammon  could  refuse,  an  uproar  arose  within,  a  rush 
outward  of  the  mob,  and  inward  of  the  prefect’s  apparitors. 

“  It  is  false  !  ”  shouted  many  voices.  “  A  Jewish  calumny.  The 
man  is  innocent  !  ” 

“  There’s  no  more  sedition  in  him  than  there  is  in  me,”  roared 
a  fat  butcher,  who  looked  as  ready  to  fell  a  man  as  an  ox.  “He 
was  always  the  first  and  the  last  to  clap  the  holy  patriarch  at 
sermon.” 

“  Dear  tender  soul,”  whimpered  a  woman;  “and  I  said  to  him  only 
this  morning,  ‘Why  don’t  you  fiog  my  boys.  Master  Hierax  ?  how 
can  you  expect  them  to  learn  if  they  are  not  flogged  ?’  And  he  said 
he  never  could  abide  the  sight  of  a  rod,  it  made  his  back  tingle  so.” 

“  Which  was  plainly  a  prophecy  !  ” 

“  And  proves  him  innocent  ;  for  how  could  he  prophesy  if  he  was 
not  one  the  holv  ones  ?  ” 

,  “  Monies  to  the  re.^cue  !  Hierax  a  Christian  is  taken  and  tortured 
in  the  theater  !  ”  tinindered  a  wild  hermit,  his  beard  and  hair  stream¬ 
ing  about  his  chest  and  shoulders. 

“  Nitria  !  Nitria  !  For  God  and  the  mother  of  God,  monks  of  Ni- 
tria  !  Down  with  the  Jewish  slanderers  !  Down  with  heathen 
tyrants  !  ”  And  the  mob,  re-enforced  as  if  by  magic  by  hundreds 
from  without,  swept  down  the  huge  vaulted  passage,  carrying  Phil¬ 
ammon  and  the  porter  with  them. 

“My  friends,”  quoth  the  little  man,  trying  to  look  philosophically 
calm,  though  he  was  fairly  otf  his  legs,  and  hanging  between 
heaven  and  earth  on  the  elbows  of  the  by-standers  ;  “  whence  this 
tumult  ?  ” 

“The  Jews  got  up  a  cry  that  Hierax  wanted  to  raise  a  riot. 
Curse  them  and  their  Sabbath,  they’re  always  rioting  on  Saturdays 
about  this  dancer  of  theirs,  instead  of  working  like  honest  Chris¬ 
tians  !  ” 

“  And  rioting  on  Sunday  instead.  Ahem  !  sectarian  differences, 
which  the  philosopher - ” 

The  rest  of  the  sentence  disappeared  with  the  speaker,  as  a  sud¬ 
den  opening  of  the  mob  let  him  drop,  and  buried  him  under  innumer¬ 
able  legs. 

Philammon,  furious  at  the  notion  of  persecution,  maddened  by  the 
cries  around  him,  found  himself  bursting  fiercely  through  the  crowd, 


A  DAT  M  ALEXAJTDniA. 


65 


till  he  reached  the  front  ranks,  where  tall  gates  of  open  iron- work 
barred  all  farther  progress,  but  left  a  full  view  of  the  tragedy  which 
was  enacting  within,  where  the  poor  innocent  wretch,  suspended 
from  a  gibbet,  writhed  and  shrieked  at  every  stroke  of  the  hide- 
whips  of  his  tormentors. 

In  vain  Philammon  and  the  monks  around  him  knocked  and  beat 
at  the  gates  ;  they  were  only  answered  by  laughter  and  taunts  from 
the  apparitors  within,  curses  on  the  turbulent  mob  of  Alexandria, 
with  its  patriarch,  clergy,  saints,  and  churches,  and  promises  to  each 
and  all  outside,  that  their  turn  would  come  next ;  while  the  piteous 
screams  grew  fainter  and  more  faint,  and  at  last,  with  a  convulsive 
shudder,  motion  and  suifering  ceased  forever  in  the  i)oor  mangled 
body. 

“  They  have  killed  him  !  Martyred  him  !  Back  to  the  archbishop  ! 
To  the  patriarch’s  house  ;  he  will  avenge  us  !  ”  And  as  the  horrible 
news,  and  the  watchword  which  followed  it,  passed  outward  through 
the  crowd,  they  wheeled  round  as  one  man,  and  poured  through 
street  after  street  toward  Cyril’s  house  ;  while  Philammon,  beside 
himself  with  horror,  rage,  and  pity,  hurried  onward  with  them. 

A  tumultuous  hour,  or  more,  was  passed  in  the  street,  before  he 
could  gain  entrance  ;  and  then  he  was  swept,  along  with  the  mob  in 
which  he  had  been  fast  wedged,  through  a  dark,  low  passage,  and 
landed  breathless  in  a  quadrangle  of  mean  and  new  buildings,  over¬ 
hung  by  the  four  hundred  stately  columns  of  the  ruined  Serapeiurn. 
The  grass  was  already  growing  on  the  ruined  capitals  and  archi¬ 
traves . Little  did  even  its  destroyers  dream  then  that  the  day 

would  come  when  one  only  of  that  four  hundred  would  be  left,  as 
“Pompey’s  Pillar,”  to  show  what  the  men  of  old  could  think  and  do. 

Philammon  at  last  escaped  from  the  crowd,  and,  putting  the  letter 
which  he  had  carried  in  his  bosom  into  the  hands  of  one  of  the  priests 
who  was  mixing  with  the  mob,  was  beckoned  by  him  into  a  corridor, 
and  up  a  flight  of  stairs,  and  into  a  large,  low,  mean  room,  and  there, 
by  virtue  of  the  world- wide  freemasonry  which  Christianity  had,  for 
the  first  time  on  earth,  established,  found  himself  in  five  minutes 
awaiting  the  summons  of  the  most  powerful  man  south  of  the  Medi¬ 
terranean. 

A  curtain  hung  across  the  door  of  the  inner  chamber,  through 
which  Philammon  could  hear  plainly  the  stops  of  some  one  walking- 
up  and  down  hurriedly  and  fiercely. 

“  They  will  drive  me  to  it  !”  at  last  burst  out  a  deep,  sonorous 

voice.  “  They  will  drive  me  to  it . Their  blood  be  on  their  own 

head  !  Is  it  not  enough  for  them  to  blaspheme  God  and  his  Church, 
to  have  the  monopoly  of  all  the  cheating,  fortune-telling,  usury, 
sorcery,  and  coining  of  the  city,  but  they  must  deliver  my  clergy  into 
the  hands  of  the  tyrant  ?  ” 

“It  was  so  even  in  the  Apostles’  time,”  suggested  a  softer,  but  far 
more  unpleasant  voice. 

UYPATIA — 3 


ee 


ItTPATlA. 


“  Then  it  shall  be  so  no  longer  !  God  has  given  me  the  power  to 
stop  them  ;  and  God  do  so  to  me,  and  more  also,  if  I  do  not  use  that 
power.  To-morrow  I  sweep  out  this  Augean  stable  of  villainy,  and 
leave  not  a  Jew  to  blaspheme  and  cheat  in  Alexandria.” 

“I  am  afraid  such  a  judgment,  however  righteous,  might  offend 
his  excellency  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  His  excellency  !  His  tyranny  !  Why  does  Orestes  truckle  to 
these  circumcised,  but  because  they  lend  money  to  him  and  to  his 
creatures  ?  He  would  keep  up  a  den  of  fiends  in  Alexandria  if  they 
would  do  as  much  for  him  !  And  then  to  play  them  off  against  me 
and  mine,  to  bring  religion  into  contempt  by  setting  the  mob  together 
by  the  ears,  and  to  end  with  outrages  like  this  !  Seditious  ?  Have 
they  not  cause  enough  ?  The  sooner  I  remove  one  of  their  tempta¬ 
tions,  the  better  :  let  the  other  tempter  beware!  lest  his  judgment  be 
at  hand  !  ” 

“  The  prefect,  your  holiness  asked  the  other  voice,  slyly. 

“  Who  spoke  of  the  prefect  ?  Whosoever  is  a  tyrant,  and  a  mur¬ 
derer,  and  an  oppressor  of  the  poor,  and  a  favorer  of  the  philosophy 
which  despises  and  enslaves  the  poor,  should  not  he  perish,  though 
he  be  seven  times  a  prefect  ?  ” 

At  this  juncture  Philammon,  thinking  perhaps  that  he  had  already 
heard  too  much,  notified  his  presence  by  some  slight  noise,  at  which 
the  secretary,  as  he  seemed  to  be,  hastily  lifted  the  curtain,  and 
somewhat  sharply  demanded  his  business.  The  names  of  Pambo  and 
Arsenius,  however,  seemed  to  pacify  him  at  once  ;  and  the  trembling 
youth  was  ushered  into  the  presence  of  him  who  in  reality,  though 
not  in  name,  sat  on  the  throne  of  the  Pharaohs. 

IS'ot,  indeed,  in  their  outward  pomp  ;  the  furniture  of  the  chamber 
was  but  a  grade  above  that  of  the  artisan’s  ;  the  dress  of  the  great 
man  was  coarse  and  simple  ;  if  personal  vanity  peeped  out  anyw'here, 
it  was  in  the  careful  arrangement  of  the  bushy  beard,  and  of  the  few 
curling  locks  which  the  tonsure  had  spared.  But  the  height  and 
majesty  of  his  figure,  the  stern  and  massive  beauty  of  his  features, 
the  fiashing  eye,  curling  lip,  and  projecting  brow, — all  marked  him 
as  one  born  to  command.  As  the  youth  entered,  Cyril  stopped  short 
in  his  walk,  and  looking  him  through  and  through,  wdth  a  glance 
which  burned  upon  his  cheeks  like  fire,  and  made  him  all  but  wdsh 
the  kindly  earth  would  open  and  hide  him,  took  the  letters,  read 
them,  and  then  began:  — 

“Philammon.  A  Greek.  You  are  said  to  have  learned  to  obev. 
If  so,  you  have  also  learned  to  rule.  Your  father- abbot  has  trans¬ 
ferred  you  to  my  tutelage.  You  are  now  to  obey  me.” 

‘  ‘  And  I  will.” 

“  Well  said.  Go  to  that  window,  then,  and  leap  into  the  court.” 

Philammon  walked  to  it,  and  opened  it.  The  pavement  was  full 
twenty  feet  below  ;  but  his  business  was  to  obey,  and  not  take  meas¬ 
urements.  There  was  a  flower  in  a  vase  upon  the  sill.  He  quietly 


i 


- » 


A  DAY  m  ALEXANDRIA.  67 

removed  it,  and  in  an  instant  more  would  have  leaped,  for  life  or 
death,  when  Cyril’s  voice  thundered,  “  Stop  !  ” 

“  The  lad  will  pass,  my  Peter.  I  shall  not  be  afraid,  now,  for  the 
secrets  which  he  may  have  overheard.” 

Peter  smiled  assent,  looking  all  the  while  as  if  he  thought  it  a 
great  pity  that  the  young  man  had  not  been  allowed  to  put  tale-bearing 
out  of  his  own  power,  by  breaking  his  neck. 

“You  wish  to  see  the  world?  Perhaps  you  have  seen  something 
of  it  to-day.” 

“  I  saw  the  murder - ” 

“  Then  you  saw  what  you  came  hither  to  see  ;  what  the  world  is, 
and  what  justice  and  mercy  it  can  deal  out.  You  would  not  dislike 
to  see  God’s  reprisals  to  man’s  tyranny?. ..  .Or  to  be  a  fellow- worker 
with  God  therein,  if  I  judge  rightly  by  your  looks?” 

“  I  would  avenge  that  man.” 

“  Ah  !  my  poor  simple  schoolmaster  !  And  his  fate  is  the  portent 
of  portents  to  you  now  !  Stay  awhile,  till  you  have  gone  with  Ezekiel 
into  the  inner  chambers  of  the  Devil’s  temple,  and  you  will  see  worse 
things  than  these, — women  weeping  for  Thammuz  ;  bemoaning  the 
decay  of  an  idolatry  which  they  themselves  disbelieve.  That,  too, 
is  on  the  list  of  Hercules’s  labors,  Peter  mine.” 

At  this  moment  a  deacon  entered . “Your  holiness,  the  rabbis 

of  the  accursed  nation  are  below,  at  your  summons.  We  brought 
them  in  through  the  back  gate,  for  fear  of - ” 

“Right,  right.  An  accident  to  them  might  have  ruined  us.  I 
shall  not  forget  you.  Bring  them  up.  Peter,  take  this  youth,  intro¬ 
duce  him  to  the  parabolani . Who  will  be  the  best  man  for  him  to 

work  under  ?  ” 

“  The  brother  Theopompus  is  especially  sober  and  gentle.” 

Cyril  shook  his  head  laughingly . “Go  into  the  next  room,  my 

son . No,  Peter,  put  him  under  some  fiery  saint,  some  true 

Boanerges,  who  will  talk  him  down,  and  work  him  to  death,  and  show 
him  the  best  and  the  worst  of  everything.  Cleitophon  will  be  the 
man.  Now  then,  let  me  See  my  engagements :  five  minutes  for  these 
Jews, — Orestes  did  not  choose  to  frighten  them  :  let  us  see  whether 
Cyril  cannot ;  then  an  hour  to  look  over  the  hospital  accounts  ;  an 
hour  for  the  schools  ;  a  half-hour  for  the  reserved  cases  of  distress  ; 
and  another  half-hour  for  myself  ;  and  then  divine  service.  See  that 
the  boy  is  there.  Do  bring  in  every  one  in  his  turn,  Peter  mine. 
So  much  time  goes  in  hunting  for  this  man  and  that  man ....  and  life 
is  too  short  for  all  that.  Where  are  these  Jews?  ”  and  Cyril  plunged 
into  the  latter  half  of  his  day’s  work  with  that  untiring  energy,  self- 
sacrifice,  and  method  which  commanded  for  him,  in  spite  of  all  sus¬ 
picions  of  his  violence,  ambition,  and  intrigue,  the  loving  awe  and 
implicit  obedience  of  several  hundred  thousand  human  beings. 

So  Philammon  went  out  with  the  parabolani,  a  sort  of  organized 
guild  of  district  visitors . And  in  their  comjDany  he  saw  that  after- 


68 


HYPATIA. 


noon  the  dark  side  of  that  world,  whereof  the  harbor-panorama  had 
been  the  bright  one.  In  squalid  misery,  filth,  profligacy,  ignorance, 
ferocity,  discontent,  neglected  in  body,  house,  and  soul  by  the  civil 
authorities,  proving  their  existence  only  in  aimless  and  sanguinary 
riots,  there  they  starved  and  rotted,  heap  on  heap,  the  masses  of  the 
old  Greek  population  close  to  the  great  food -exporting  harbor  of  the 
world.  Among  these,  fiercely  perhaps,  and  fanatically,  but  still 
among  them,  and  for  them,  labored  those  district  visitors,  night  and 
day.  And  so  Pliilammon  toiled  away  with  them,  carrying  food  and 
clothing,  helping  sick  to  the  hospital,  and  dead  to  the  burial  ;  clean¬ 
ing  out  the  infected  houses, — for  the  fever  was  all  but  perennial  in 
those  quarters, — and  comforting  the  dying  with  the  good  news  of  for¬ 
giveness  from  above  ;  till  the  larger  number  had  to  return  for  evening 
service.  He,  however,  was  kept  by  his  superior,  watching  at  a  sick 
bedside,  and  it  was  late  at  night  before  he  got  home,  and  was  report¬ 
ed  to  Peter  the  Reader,  as  having  acquitted  himself  like  “  a  man  of 
God,”  as  indeed,  without  the  least  thought  of  doing  anything  noble 
or  self-sacrificing,  he  had  truly  done,  being  a  monk.  And  so  he 
threw  himself  on  a  truckle-bed,  in  one  of  the  many  cells  which 
opened  off  a  long  corridor,  and  fell  fast  asleep  in  a  minute. 

He  was  just  weltering  about  in  a  dreary, dream- jumble  of  Goths  dan¬ 
cing  with  district  visitors,  Pelagia  as  an  angel,  with  peacock’s  wings ; 
Hypatia  with  horns  and  cloven  feet,  riding  three  hippopotami  at  once 
round  the  theater  ;  Cyril  standing  at  an  open  window,  cursing  fright¬ 
fully,  and  pelting  him  with  fiower-pots  ;  and  a  similar  self-sown  after- 
crop  of  his  day’s  impressions  ;  when  he  was  awakened  by  the  tramp  of 
hurried  feet  in  the  street  outside,  and  shouts,  which  gradually,  as  he 
became  conscious,  shaped  themselves  into  cries  of  “Alexander’s 
church  is  on  fire  !  Help,  good  Christians  !  Fire  !  Help  !  ” 

Whereat  he  sat  up  in  his  truckle-bed,  tried  to  recollect  where  he 
W'as,  and  having  with  some  trouble  succeeded,  threw  on  his  sheep¬ 
skin,  and  jumped  up  to  ask  the  news  from  the  deacons  and  monks 
who  were  hurrying  along  the  corridor  outside.  “  Yes,  Alexander’s 
church  was  on  fire;  ”  and  down  the  stairs  they  poured,  across  the 
court-yard,  and  out  into  the  street,  Peter’s  tall  figure  serving  as  a 
standard  and  rallying- point. 

As  they  rushed  out  through  the  gateway,  Pliilammon,  dazzled  by 
the  sudden  transition  from  the  darkness  within  to  the  blaze  of  moon 
and  star  light  which  fiooded  the  street,  the  walls,  and  shining  roofs, 
hung  back  a  moment.  That  hesitation  probably  saved  his  life  ;  for 
in  an  instant  he  saw  a  dark  figure  spring  out  of  the  shadow,  a  long 
knife  flashed  across  his  eyes, and  a  priest  next  to  him  sunk  upon  the 
pavement  with  a  groan,  while  the  assassin  dashed  off  down  the  street, 
hotly  pursued  by  monks  and  parabolani. 

Pliilammon,  who  ran  like  a  desert  ostrich,  had  soon  outstripped  all 
but  Peter,  when  several  more  dark  figures  sprung  out  of  doorways  and 
corners,  and  joined,  or  seemed  to  join,  the  pursuit.  Suddenly,  how- 


A  DAY  m  ALDTAnontA, 


6^ 


ever,  after  running  a  hundred  yards,  they  drew  up  opposite  the  mouth 
of  a  side  street  ;  the  assassin  stopped  also.  Peter,  suspecting  some¬ 
thing  wrong,  slackened  his  pace,  and  caught  Philammon’s  arm. 

“  Do  you  see  tliose  fellows  in  the  shadow  ?” 

But,  before  Philammon  could  answer,  some  thirty  or  forty  men, 
their  daggers  gleaming  in  the  moonlight,  moved  out  into  the  middle 
of  the  street,  and  received  the  fugitives  in  their  ranks.  Wliat  was 
the  meaning  of  it  ?  Here  was  a  peasant  taste  of  the  ways  of  the  most 
Chrisdan  and  civilized  city  of  the  Empire  ! 

“  Well,”  thought  Philammon,  “  I  have  come  out  to  see  the  world, 
and  I  seem,  at  this  rate,  to  be  liltely  to  see  enough  of  it.” 

Peter  turned  at  once,  and  fled  as  quickly  as  he  had  pursued,  while 
Philammon,  considering  discretion  the  better  part  of  valor,  followed, 
and  they  rejoined  their  party,  breathless. 

“  There  is  an  armed  mob  at  the  end  of  the  street.” 

“  Assassins  !  ”  “  Jews  !  ”  “A  conspiracy  !  ”  Up  rose  a  Babel  of 
doubtful  voices.  The  foe  appeared  in  sight,  advancing  stealthily, 
and  the  whole  party  took  to  hight,  led  once  more  by  Peter,  who 
seemed  determined  to  make  free  use,  in  behalf  of  his  own  safety,  of 
the  long  legs  which  nature  had  given  him. 

Philammon  followed,  sulkily,  and  unwillingly,  at  a  foot’s  pace;  but 
he  had  not  gone  a  dozen  yards  when  a  pitiable  voice  at  his  feet  called 
to  him, — 

“  Help  !  mercy  !  Do  not  leave  me  here  to  be  murdered  !  I  am  a 
Christian  ;  indeed  I  am  a  Christian  I  ” 

Philammon  stooped,  and  lifted  from  the  ground  a  comely  negro- 
woman,  weeping,  and  shivering  in  a  few  tattered  remnants  of  cloth¬ 
ing. 

“Iran  out  when  they  said  the  church  was  on  fire,”  sobbed  the 
poor  creature,  “  and  the  Jews  beat  and  wounded  me.  They  tore  my 
shawl  and  tunic  off  me  before  I  could  get  away  from  them  ;  and  then 
our  own  people  ran  over  me,  and  trod  me  down.  And  now  luy  hus¬ 
band  will  beat  me,  if  I  ever  get  home.  Quick  !  up  this  side  street,  or 
we  shall  be  murdered  !  ” 

The  armed  men,  whosoever  they  were,  were  close  on  them.  There 
was  no  time  to  be  lost  ;  and  Philammon,  assuring  her  that  he  would 
not  desert  her,  hurried  her  up  the  side  street  which  she  pointed  out. 
But  the  pursuers  had  caught  sight  of  them,  and  while  the  mass  held 
on  up  the  main  street,  three  or  four  turned  aside  and  gave  chase. 
The  poor  negress  could  only  limp  along,  and  Philammon,  unarmed, 
looked  back,  and  saw  the  bright  steel  points  gleaming  in  the  moon¬ 
light,  and  made  up  his  mind  to  die  as  a  monk  should.  Nevertheless, 
youth  is  hopeful.  One  chance  for  life  !  He  thrust  the  negress  into 
a  dark  doorway,  where  her  color  hid  her  well  enough,  and  had  just 
time  to  ensconce  himself  behind  a  pillar,  when  the  foremost  pursuer 
reached  him.  He  held  his  breath  in  fearful  suspense.  Should  he  be 
seen?  He  would  not  die  without  a  struggle,  at  least.  No  !  the  fel- 


TO 


HYP  ATI  A. 


low  ran  on,  panting.  But  in  a  minute  more  another  came  up,  saw 
him  suddenly,  and  sprung  aside  startled.  That  start  saved  Philam- 
mon.  Quick  as  a  cat,  he  leaped  upon  him,  felled  him  to  the  earth 
with  a  single  blow,  tore  the  dagger  from  his  hand,  and  sprung  to  his 
feet  again  just  in  time  to  strike  his  new  weapon  full  into  the  third 
pursuer’s  face.  The  man  put  his  hand  to  his  head,  and  recoiled  against 
a  fellow-ruffian,  who  was  close  on  his  heels.  Philammon,  flushed 
with  victory,  took  advantage  of  the  confusion,  and  before  the  worthy 
pair  could  recover,  dealt  them  half  a  dozen  blows,  which,  luckily  for 
them,  came  from  an  unpracticed  hand,  or  the  young  monk  might 
have  had  more  than  one  life  to  answer  for.  As  it  was,  they  turned 
and  limped  off,  cursing  in  an  unknown  tongue  ;  and  Philammon 
found  himself  triumphant  and  alone,  with  the  trembling  negress  and 
the  prostrate  ruffian,  who,  stunned  by  the  blow  and  the  fall,  lay 
groaning  on  the  pavement. 

It  was  all  over  in  a  minute . The  negress  was  kneeling  under 

the  gateway,  pouring  out  her  simple  thanks  to  Heaven  for  this  unex¬ 
pected  deliverance  ;  and  Philammon  was  about  to  kneel  too,  when  a 
thought  struck  him  ;  and,  coolly  despoiling  the  Jew  of  his  shawl  and 
sash,  he  handed  them  over  to  the  poor  negress,  considering  them 
fairly  enough  as  his  own  by  right  of  conquest :  but,  lo  and  behold  ! 
as  she  was  overwhelming  him  with  thanks,  a  fresh  mob  poured  into 
the  street  from  the  upper  end,  and  were  close  on  them  before  they 

were  aware . A  flush  of  terror  and  despair,. . .  .and  then  a  burst  of 

joy,  as,  by  mingled  moonlight  and  torchlight,  Philammon  descried 
priestly  robes,  and  in  the  forefront  of  the  battle — there  being  no  ap¬ 
parent  danger — Peter  the  Reader,  who  seemed  to  be  anxious  to  pre¬ 
vent  inquiry,  by  beginning  to  talk  as  fast  as  possible. 

‘  ‘  Ah,  boy  !  Safe  ?  The  saints  be  praised  !  We  gave  you  up  for 
dead  !  Who  have  you  here  ?  A  prisoner  ?  And  we  have  another. 
He  ran  right  into  our  arms  up  the  street,  and  the  Lord  delivered  him 
into  our  hand.  He  must  have  passed  you.” 

“So  he  did,”  said  Philammon,  dragging  up  his  captive,  “and 
here  is  his  fellow-scoundrel.”  Whereon  the  two  worthies  were 
speedily  tied  together  by  the  elbows  ;  and  the  party  marched  on 
once  more  in  search  of  Alexander’s  church,  and  the  supposed  confla¬ 
gration. 

Philammon  looked  round  for  the  negress,  but  she  had  vanished. 
He  was  far  too  much  ashamed  of  being  known  to  have  been  alone 
with  a  woman  to  say  anything  about  her.  Yet  he  longed  to  see  her 
again ;  an  interest — even  something  like  an  affection — had  already 
sprung  up  in  his  heart  toward  the  poor  simple  creature  whom  he  had 
delivered  from  death.  Instead  of  thinking  her  ungrateful  for  not 
staying  to  tell  what  he  had  done  for  her,  he  was  thankful  to  her  for 

having  saved  his  blushes,  by  disajmeariiig  so  opportunely . And 

he  longed  to  tell  her  so, — to  know  if  she  was  hurt, — to .  O  Phil¬ 
ammon  !  only  four  days  from  the  Laura,  and  a  whole  regiment  of 


A  DAT  m  ALEXAmRTA. 


n 


women  acquaintances  already  !  True,  Providence  having  sent  into 
the  world  about  as  many  women  as  men,  it  may  be  dithcnlt  to  keep 
out  of  their  way  altogether.  Perhaps,  too.  Providence  may  have 
intended  them  to  be  of  some  use  to  that  other  sex,  with  whom  it  lias 
so  mixed  them  up.  Don’t  argue,  poor  Philammon  ;  Alexander’s 
church  is  on  fire  ! — forward  ! 

And  so  they  hurried  on,  a  confused  mass  of  monks  and  populace, 
with  their  hapless  prisoners  in  the  center,  who,  hauled,  cuffed,  ques¬ 
tioned,  and  cursed,  by  twenty  self-elected  inquisitors  at  once,  thought 
fit,  either  from  Jewish  obstinacy,  or  sheer  bewilderment,  to  give  no 
account  whatsoever  of  themselves. 

As  they  turned  the  corner  of  a  street,  the  folding-doors  of  a  large 
gateway  rolled  open  ;  a  long  lane  of  glittering  figures  poured  across 
the  road,  dropped  their  spear-buts  on  the  pavement  with  a  single 
rattle,  and  remained  motionless.  The  front  rank  of  the  mob  re¬ 
coiled  ;  and  an  awestruck  whisper  ran  through  them . “The 

Stationaries  !  ” 

“  Who  are  they?”  asked  Philammon,  in  a  whisper.  , 

“  The  soldiers, — the  Roman  soldiers,”  answered  a  whisperer  to 
him. 

Philammon,  who  was  among  the  leaders,  had  recoiled  too, — he 
hardly  knew  why, — at  that  stern  apparition.  His  next  instinct  was 

to  press  forward  as  close  as  he  dared . And  these  were  Roman 

soldiers  ! — the  conquerors  of  the  world  ! — the  men  whose  name  had 
thrilled  him  from  his  childhood  with  vague  awe  and  admiration, 

dimly  heard  of  up  there  in  the  lonely  Laura . Roman  soldiers  ! 

And  here  he  was  face  to  face  with  them  at  last ! 

His  curiosity  received  a  sudden  check,  however,  as  he  found  his 
arm  seized  by  an  officer,  as  he  took  him  to  be,  from  the  gold  orna¬ 
ments  on  his  helmet  and  cuirass,  who  lifted  his  vine-stock  threaten¬ 
ingly  over  the  young  monk’s  head,  and  demanded, — 

“  What’s  all  this  about  ?  Why  are  you  not  quietly  in  your  beds, 
you  Alexandrian  rascals  ?  ” 

“  Alexander’s  church  is  on  fire^”  answered  Philammon,  thinking 
the  shortest  answer  the  wisest. 

“  So  much  the  better.” 

“And  the  Jews  are  murdering  the  Christians.” 

“  Fight  it  out,  then.  Turn  in,  men  ;  it’s  only  a  riot.” 

And  the  steel-clad  apparition  suddenly  fiashed  round,  and  vanished, 
trampling  and  jingling  into  the  dark  jaws  of  the  guard-house  gate, 
while  the  stream,  its  temporary  barrier  removed,  rushed  on  wilder 
than  ever. 

Philammon  hurried  on  too  with  them,  not  without  a  strange  feel¬ 
ing  of  disappointment.  “Only  a  riot  !”  Peter  was  chuckling  to  his 
brothers  over  their  cleverness  in  “  having  kept  the  prisoners  in  the 
middle,  and  stopped  the  rascals’  mouths  till  they  were  past  the  guard¬ 
house.”  “  A  fine  thing  to  boast  of ,”  thought  Philammon,  “in  the 


HYPATIA. 


n 

face  of  tlie  men  wlio  make  and  unmake  kings  and  Caesars  !  ‘  Only 

a  riot  !  ’  ”  He,  and  the  corps  of  district  visitors,— whom  he  fancied 
the  most  august  body  on  earth, — and  Alexander’s  church,  Christians 
murdered  by  Jews,  persecution  of  the  Catholic  faith,  and  all  the  rest 
of  it,  was  simply,  then,  not  worth  the  notice  of  those  forty  men, 
alone  and  secure  in  the  sense  of  power  and  discipline  among  tens  of 

thousands . He  hated  them,  those  soldiers.  Was  it  because  they 

were  indifferent  to  the  cause  of  the  Church  ?. . .  .or  because  they  were 
indifferent  to  the  cause  of  whicli  lie  was  inclined  to  think  himself  a 
not  unimportant  member,  on  the  strength  of  his  late  Samsonic  de¬ 
feat  of  Jewish  persecutors  ?  At  least,  he  obeyed  the  little  porter’s 
advice,  and  “  felt  very  small  indeed.” 

And  he  felt  smaller  still,  being  young  and  alive  to  .ridicule,  when, 
at  some  sudden  ebb  or  flow,  wave  or  wavelet,  of  the  Babel  sea,  which 
weltered  up  and  down  every  street,  a  shrill  female  voice  informed 
them  from  an  upper  window  that  Alexander’s  church  was  not  on  fire 
at  all ;  that  she  had  gone  to  the  top  of  the  house,  as  they  might  have 
gone,  if  they  had  not  been  fools,  etc.,  etc.  ;  and  that  it  “looked  as 
safe  and  as  ugly  as  ever  ;  ”  wherewith,  a  brickbat  or  two  having  been 
sent  up  in  answer,  she  shut  the  blinds,  leaving  them  to  halt,  inquire, 
discover  gradually  and  piecemeal,  after  the  method  of  mobs,  they 
had  been  following  the  nature  of  mobs  ;  that  no  one  had  seen  the 
church  on  fire,  or  seen  any  one  else  who  had  seen  the  same,  or  even 
seen  any  light  in  the  sky  in  any  quarter,  or  knew  who  raised  the  cry; 
or— or— in  short,  Alexander’s  church  was  two  miles  off ;  if  it  was  on 
fire,  it  was  either  burned  down  or  saved  by  this  time  ;  if  not,  the 
nigiit  air  was,  to  say  the  least,  chilly  ;  and,  whether  it  was  or  not, 
there  were  ambuscades  of  Jews— Satan  only  knew  how  strong— in 
every  street  between  them  and  it . Might  it  not  be  better  to  se¬ 

cure  their  two  prisoners,  and  then  ask  for  further  orders  from  the 
archbishop  ?  Wherewith,  after  the  manner  of  mobs,  they  melted  off 
the  wav  they  came,  by  twos  and  threes,  till  those  of  a  contrary  opin¬ 
ion  beg*an  to  find  themselves  left  alone,  and,  having  a  strong  dislilie 
to  Jewish  daggers,  were  fain  to  follow  the  stream. 

With  a  panic  or  two,  a  cry  of  “The  Jews  are  on  us  !”  and  a  gen¬ 
eral  rush  in  every  direction  (in  which  one  or  two,  seeking  shelter 
from  the  awful  nothing  in  neigliboring  houses,  were  handed  over  to 
the  watch  as  burglars,  and  sent  to  the  quarries  accordingly),  they 
reached  the  Serapeium,  and  there  found,  of  course,  a  counter-mob 
collected  to  inform  them  that  they  had  been  taken  in, — that  Alexan¬ 
der’s  church  had  never  been  on  fire  at  all, — that  the  Jews  had  mur¬ 
dered  a  thousand  Christians  at  least,  though  three  dead  bodies, 
including  the  poor  priest  who  lay  in  the  house  within,  were  all  of 
the  thousand  who  had  yet  been  seen,— and  that  the  whole  Jews’ quar¬ 
ter  was  marching  upon  them.  At  which  news  it  was  considered  ad¬ 
visable  to  retreat  into  the  archbishop’s  house  as  quickly  as  possible, 
barricade  the  doors,  and  prepare  for  a  siege,— a  work  at  which  Phil- 


A  DAY  m  ALEXANDRIA. 


73 


ammon  performed  prodigies,  tearing  wood-work  from  the  rooms, 
and  stones  from  the  parapets,  before  it  struck  some  of  the  more 
sober-minded  that  it  was  as  well  to  wait  for  some  more  decided 
demonstration  of  attack  before  incurring  so  heavy  a  carpenter’s  bill 
of  repairs. 

At  last  the  heavy  tramp  of  footsteps  was  heard  coming  down  the 
street,  and  every  window  was  crowded  in  an  instant  with  eager 
heads  ;  while  Peter  rushed  down-stairs  to  heat  the  large  coppers, 
having  some  experience  in  the  defensive  virtues  of  boiling  water. 
The  bright  moon  glittered  on  a  long  line  of  helmets  and  cuirasses. 
Thank  Heaven  !  it  was  the  soldiery. 

“  Are  the  Jews  coming  ?  ”  “Is  the  city  quiet  ?  ”  “  Why  did  not 

you  prevent  this  villainy  ? ”  “A  thousand  citizens  murdered  while 
you  have  been  snoring  !  ” — and  a  volley  of  similar  ejaculations,  greetec 
the  soldiers  as  they  passed,  and  were  answered  by  a  cool — “  To  your 
perches,  and  sleep,  you  noisy  chickens,  or  we’ll  set  the  coop  on  fire 
about  your  ears  !  ” 

A  yell  of  defiance  answered  this  polite  speech,  and  the  soldiery, 
who  knew  perfectly  well  that  the  unarmed  ecclesiastics  within  were 
not  to  be  trifled  with,  and  had  no  ambition  to  die  by  coping-stones 
and  hot  water,  went  quietly  on  their  way. 

All  danger  was  now  passed  ;  and  the  cackling  rose  jubilant,  louder 
than  ever,  and  might  have  continued  till  daylight,  had  not  a  window 
in  the  court-yard  been  suddenly  thrown  open,  and  the  awful  voice  of 
Cyril  commanded  silence. 

“  Every  man  sleep  where  he  can.  I  shall  want  you  at  day-break. 
The  superiors  of  the  parabolani  are  to  come  up  to  me  with  the  two 
prisoners,  and  the  men  who  took  them.” 

In  a  few  minutes  Philammon  found  himself,  with  some  twenty 
others,  in  the  great  man’s  presence  :  he  was  sitting  at  his  desk, 
writing,  quietly,  small  notes  on  slips  of  paper. 

“  Here  is  the  youth  who  helped  me  to  pursue  the  murderer,  and, 
having  outrun  me,  was  attacked  by  the  prisoners,”  said  Peter.  “My 
hands  are  clean  from  blood,  I  thank  the  Lord  !  ” 

“  Three  set  on  me  with  daggers,”  said  Philammon,  apologetically, 
“and  I  was  forced  to  take  this  one’s  dagger  away,  and  beat  off  the 
two  others  with  it.” 

Cyril  sttiiled,  and  shook  his  head. 

“Thou  art  a  brave  boy  ;  but  hast  thou  not  read,  ‘  If  a  man  smite 
thee  on  one  cheek,  turn  to  him  the  other  ?  ’  ” 

“  I  could  not  run  away,  as  Master  Peter  and  the  rest  did.” 

“  So  you  ran  away,  eh,  my  worthy  friend?” 

“  Is  it  not  written,”  asked  Peter,  in  his  blandest  tone,  “  ‘  If  they 
persecute  you  in  one  city,  flee  unto  another  ?  ’  ” 

Cyril  smiled  again.  “  And  why  could  not  you  run  away,  boy?” 

Philammon  blushed  scarlet,  but  he  dared  not  lie.  “  There  was  a 
'•-a  poor  black  woman,  wounded  arid  trodden  down,  and  I  dare  not 
leave  her,  for  she  told  me  she  was  a  Christian.” 


74 


HYPATIA. 


“  Right,  my  son,  right.  I  shall  remember  tiiis.  What  was  her 
name  ?  ” 

“  I  did  not  hear  it. — Stay,  I  think  she  said  Judith.’' 

“  Ah  !  the  wife  of  the  porter,  who  stands  at  the  lecture- room  door, 
which  God  confound  !  A  devout  woman,  full  of  good  works,  and 
sorely  ill-treated  by  her  heathen  husband.  Peter,  thou  slialt  go  to 
her  to-morrow  with  the  physician,  and  see  if  she  is  in  need  of  any¬ 
thing.  Boy,  thou  hast  done  well.  Cyril  never  forgets.  Now  bring 
up  those  Jews.  Their  rabbis  were  with  me  two  hours  ago  promising 
peace  :  and  this  is  the  way  they  have  kept  their  promise.  So  be  it. 
The  vvicked  is  snared  in  his  own  wickedness.” 

The  Jews  were  brought  in,  but  kept  a  stubborn  silence. 

“Your  holiness  perceives,”  said  some  one,  “that  they  have  each 
of  them  rings  of  green  palm-bark  on  their  right  hand.” 

‘  ‘  A  very  dangerous  sign  !  An  evident  conspiracy  !  ”  commented 
Peter. 

“Ah?  What  does  that  mean,  you  rascals?  Answer  me,  as  you 
value  your  lives.” 

“You  have  no  business  with  us  ;  we  are  Jews,  and  none  of  your 
people,”  said  one,  sulkily. 

“  None  of  my  people?  You  have  murdered  my  people  !  None  of 
my  people  !  Every  soul  in  Alexandria  is  mine,  if  the  kingdom  of 
God  means  anything  ;  and  you  shall  find  it  out.  I  shall  not  argue 
with  you,  my  good  friends,  any  more  than  I  did  with  your  rabbis. 
Take  these  fellows  away,  Peter,  and  lock  them  up  in  the  fuel-cellar, 
and  see  that  they  are  guarded.  If  any  man  lets  them  go,  his  life 
shall  be  for  the  life  of  them.” 

And  the  two  worthies  were  led  out. 

“  Now,  my  brothers,  here  are  your  orders.  You  will  divide  these 
notes  among  yourselves,  and  distribute  them  to  trusty  and  godly 
Catholics  in  your  districts.  Wait  one  hour,  till  the  city  be  quiet  ; 
and  then  start  and  raise  the  church.  I  must  have  thirty  thousand 
men  by  sunrise.” 

“  What  for,  your  holiness?”  asked  a  dozen  voices. 

“  Read  your  notes.  Whosoever  will  fight  to-morrow  under  the 
banner  of  the  Lord,  shall  have  free  plunder  of  the  Jews’  quarter, 
outrage  and  murder  only  forbidden.  As  I  have  said  it,  God  do  so  to 
me,  and  more  also,  if  there  be  a  Jew  left  in  Alexandria  by  to-morrow 
at  noon.  Go.”  * 

And  the  staff  of  orderlies  filed  out,  thanking  Heaven  that  they 
had  a  leader  so  prompt  and  valiant,  and  spent  the  next  hour  over  the 
hall  fire,  eating  millet  cakes,  drinking  bad  beer,  likening  Cyril  to 
Barak,  Gideon,  Samson,  Jephthah,  Judas  Maccabeus,  and  all  the 
worthies  of  the  Old  Testament,  and  then  started  on  their  pacific 
errand. 

Philammon  was  about  to  follow  them,  when  Cyril  stopped  him. 

“  Stay,  my  son  ;  you  are  young  and  rash,  and  do  not  know  the  city. 


A  DAY  m  ALEXANDRIjx.  75 

Lie  down  here  and  sleep  in  tlie  anteroom.  Three  hours  hence  the 
sun  rises,  and  we  go  forth  against  the  enemies  of  the  Lord.” 

Philammon  threw  himself  on  the  floor  in  a  corner,  and  slumbered 
like  a  child,  till  he  was  awakened  in  the  gray  dawn  by  one  of  the 
parabolani. 

“  Up,  boy !  and  see  what  we  can  do.  Cyril  goes  down  greater 
than  Barak,  the  son  of  Abinoam,  not  with  ten,  but  with  thirty  thou¬ 
sand  men  at  bis  feet  !  ” 

“  Ay,  my  brothers  !”  said  Cyril,  as  he  passed  proudly  out  in  full 
pontificals,  with  a  gorgeous  retinue  of  priests  and  deacons, — “the 
Catholic  Church  has  her  organization,  her  unity,  her  common  cause, 
her  watchwords,  such  as  the  tyrants  of  the  earth,  in  their  weakness 
and  their  divisions,  may  envy  and  tremble  at,  but  cannot  imitate. 
Could  Orestes  raise,  in  three  hours,  thirty  thousand  men,  who  would 
die  for  him  ?  ” 

“  As  we  will  for  you  I  ”  shouted  many  voices. 

Say  for  the  kingdom  of  God.”  And  he  passed  out. 

And  so  ended  Philammon’s  first  day  in  Alexandria, 


/ 


CHAPTER  VI. 


THE  NEW  DIOGENES. 

Ahotjt  five  o’clock  tlie  next  morning,  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  was 
lying  in  bed,  alternately  yawning  over  a  mannscript  of  Philo  Judaeus, 
pulling  the  ears  of  his  huge  British  mastiff,  watching  the  sparkle  of 
the  fountain  in  the  court  outside,  wondering  when  that  lazy  boy 
would  come  to  tell  him  that  the  bath  was  wanned,  and  meditating, 
half  aloud . 

“  Alas  !  poor  me  !  Here  I  am,  back  again, — just  at  the  point  from 
which  I  started  !  .  . .  .  How  am  I  to  get  free  from  that  heathen  siren  ? 

Plagues  on  her  !  I  shall  end  by  falling  in  love  with  her . I  don’t 

know  that  I  have  not  got  a  barb  of  the  blind  boy  in  me  already.  I 
felt  absurdly  glad  the  other  day  wdien  that  fool  told  me  he  dare  not 
accept  her  modest  offer.  Ka  !  ha  !  A  delicious  joke  it  would  have 
been  to  have  seen  Orestes  bowing  down  to  stocks  and  stones,  and 
Hypatia  installed  in  the  ruins  of  the  Serapeium,  as  High  Priestess  of 
the  Abomination  of  Desolation  !  .  .  .  .  And  now  ....  Well  ;  I  call  all 
heaven  and  earth  to  witness  that  I  have  fought  valiantly.  I  have 
faced  naughty  little  Eros  like  a  man,  rod  in  hand.  What  could  a  poor 
human  being  do  more  than  try  to  marry  her  to  some  one  else,  in 
hopes  of  sickening  himself  of  the  whole  matter  ?  Well,  every  moth 
has  its  candle,  and  every  man  his  destiny.  But  the  daring  of  the 
little  fool  !  W^'liat  huge  imaginations  she  has  !  She  might  be  another 
Zenobia,  now,  with  Orestes  as  Odenatus,  and  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  to 
play  the  part  of  Longinus  ....  and  receive  Longinus’s  salary  of  axe 
or  poison.  She  don’t  care  for  me  ;  she  would  sacrifice  me,  or  a 
thousand  of  me,  the  cold-blooded  fanatical  archangel  that  she  is,  to 
water  with  our  blood  the  foundation  of  some  new  temple  of  cast 

rags  and  broken  dolls . O  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  what  a  fool  you 

are . You  know  you  are  going  off  as  usual  to  her  lecture,  this 

very  morning  !  ” 

At  this  crisis  of  his  confessions  the  page  entered,  and  announced, 
not  the  bath,  but  Miriam. 

The  old  woman,  who,  in  virtue  of  her  profession,  had  the  private 
entry  of  all  fashionable  chambers  in  Alexandria,  came  in  hurriedly  : 
and,  instead  of  seating  herself,  as  usual,  for  a  gossip,  remained 
standing,  and  motioned  the  boy  out  of  the  room. 

“  Well,  my  sweet  mother?  Sit.  Ah!  I  see  I  You  rascal,  you 
have  brought  in  no  wine  for  the  lady.  Don’t  you  know  her  little 
ways  yet  ?  ” 

(^6) 


THE  NEW  DIOGENES.  77 

Eos  lias  got  it  at  tlie  door,  of  course,”  answered  the  boy,  with  a 
saucy  air  of  oifended  virtue. 

“  Out  with  you,  imp  of  Satan  !  ”  cried  Miriam.  “  This  is  no  time 
for  wine-bibbing.  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  why  are  you  lying  here  ?  Did 
you  not  receive  a  note  last  night  ?  ” 

“A  note?  So  I  did  :  bar  1  was  too  sleepy  to  read  it.  There  it  lies. 

Boy,  bring  it  here . What’s  this?  A  scrap  out  of  Jeremiah? 

‘  Arise,  and  tiee  for  thy  life,  for  evil  is  determined  against  the  whole 
house  of  Israel  1  ’ — Does  this  come  from  the  chief  rabbi  ?  I  always 
took  the  venerable  father  for  a  sober  man . Eh,  Mirian  ?  ” 

“  Fool  !  instead  of  laughing  at  the  sacred  words  of  the  prophets, 
get  up  and  obey  them.  I  sent  you  the  note.” 

“  Why  can’t  I  obey  them  in  bed?  Here  I  am,  reading  hard  at  the 
Cabbala,  or  Philo, — who  is  stupidei  still, — and  what  more  would  you 
have  ?  ” 

The  old  ■woroan,  unable  to  restrain  her  impatience,  literally  ran  at 
him,  gnashing  her  teeth,  and,  before  he  was  aware,  dragged  him  out 
of  bed  upon  the  floor,  where  he  stood  meekly  wondering  what  would 
come  next. 

“  Many  thanks,  mother,  for  having  saved  me  the  one  daily  torture 
of  life,— getting  out  of  bed  by  one’s  own  exertion.” 

“  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  !  are  you  so  besotted  with  your  philosophy 
and  your  heathenry,  and  your  laziness,  and  your  contempt  for  God 
and  man,  that  you  will  see  your  nation  given  up  for  a  prey,  and  your 
wealth  plundered  by  heathen  dogs  ?  I  tell  you  Cyril  has  sworn  that 
God  shall  do  so  to  him,  and  more  also,  if  there  be  a  Jew  left  in  Alex¬ 
andria  by  to-morrow  about  this  time.” 

“  So  much  the  better  for  the  Jews,  then,  if  they  are  half  as  tired 
of  this  noisy  Pandemonium  as  I  am.  But  how  can  I  help  it  ?  Am  I 
Queen  Esther,  to  go  to  Alias  uerus  there  in  the  prefect’s  palace,  and 
get  him  to  hold  out  the  golden  scepter  to  me  ?  ” 

“  Fool  !  if  you  had  read  that  note  last  night,  you  might  have  gone 
and  saved  us,  and  your  name  would  have  been  handed  down  forever 
from  generation  to  generation  as  a  second  Mordecai.” 

‘  ‘  My  dear  mother,  Ahasuerus  would  have  been  either  fast  asleep 
or  far  too  drunk  to  listen  to  me.  Why  did  you  not  go  yourself  ?  ” 

“  Do  you  suppose  that  I  would  not  have  gone  if  I  could?  Do  you 
fancy  me  a  sluggard  like  yourself  ?  At  the  risk  of  my  life  I  have 
got  hither  in  time,  if  there  be  time,  to  save  you.” 

“  Well :  shall  I  dress  ?  What  can  be  done  now? ” 

Nothing  !  tbe  streets  are  blockaded  by  Cyril’s  mob. — There  !  do 
you  hear  the  shouts  and  screams  ?  They  are  attacking  the  farther 
part  of  the  quarter  already.  ” 

“  What  !  are  they  murdering  them?”  asked  Raphael,  throwing  on 
his  pelisse.  “Because,  if  it  has  really  come  to  a  practical  joke  of 
that  kind,  I  shall  have  the  greatest  pleasure  in  employing  a  counter- 
irritant.  Here,  boy  !  my  sword  and  dagger  ]  Quick  !  ” 


78 


HYPATIA, 


*‘No,  the  hypocrites!  No  blood  is  to  be  shed,  they  say,  if  we 
make  no  resistance,  and  let  them  pillage.  Cyril  and  his  monks  are 

there,  to  prevent  outrage,  and  so  forth . The  Angel  of  the  Lord 

scatter  them  1  ”  , 

The  conversation  was  interrupted  by  the  rushing  in  of  the  whole 
household,  in  an  agony  of  terror  ;  and  Kaphael,  at  last  thoroughly 
roused,  went  to  a  window  which  looked  into  the  street.  The 
thoroughfare  was  full  of  scolding  women  and  screaming  children  ; 
while  men,  old  and  young,  looked  on  at  the  plunder  of  their  property 
with  true  Jewish  doggedness,  too  prudent  to  resist,  but  too  manful 
complain  ;  while  furniture  came  flying  out  of  every  window,  and 
from  door  after  door  poured  a  stream  of  rascality,  carrying  off  money, 
jewels,  silks,  and  all  the  treasures  which  Jewish  usury  had  accuniu- 
lated  during  many  a  generation.  But  unmoved  amid  the  roaring  sea 
of  plunderers  and  plundered,  stood,  scattered  up  and  down,  Cyril’s 
spiritual  police,  enforcing,  by  a  word,  an  obedience  which  the  Roman 
soldiers  could  only  have  compelled  by  hard  blows  of  the  spear- but. 
There  was  to  be  no  outrage,  and  no  outrage  there  was  ;  and  more 
than  once  some  man  in  priestly  robes  hurried  through  the  crowd, 
leading  by  the  hand,  tenderly  enough,  a  lost  child  in  search  of  its 
parents. 

Raphael  stood  watching  silently,  while  Miriam,  who  had  followed 
him  up-stairs,  paced  the  room  in  an  ecstasy  of  rage,  calling  vainly  to 
him  to  speak  or  act. 

“Let  me  alope,  mother,”  he  said,  at  last.  “  It  will  be  full  ten 
minutes  more  before  they  pay  me  a  visit,  and  in  the  mean  time 
what  can  one  do  better  than  watch  the  progress  of  this,  the  little 
Exodus  ? ” 

“Not  like  that  first  one  1  Then  we  went  forth  with  cymbals  and 
songs  to  the  Red  Sea  triumph  1  Then  we  borrowed,  every  woman  of 
her  neighbor,  jewels  of  silver,  and  jewels  of  gold,  and  raiment.” 

“  And  now  we  pay  them  back  again  ; _ _  it  is  but  fair,  after  all. 

We  ought  to  have  listened  to  Jeremiah  a  thousand  years  ago,  and 
never  gone  back  again,  like  fools,  into  a  country  to  which  we  were  so 
deeply  in  debt.” 

“Accursed  land!”  cried  Miriam.  “In  an  evil  hour  our  fore¬ 
fathers  disobeyed  the  prophet  ;  and  now  we  reap  the  harvest  of  our 
sins  ! — Our  sons  have  forgotten  the  faith  of  their  forefathers  for  the 
philosophv  of  the  Gentiles,  and  All  their  chambers  ”  (with  a  contempt¬ 
uous  look  round)  “with  heathen  imagery,  and  our  daughters  are — 
Look  there  !  ” 

As  she  spoke,  a  beautiful  girl  rushed  shrieking  out  of  an  adjoining 
house,  followed  by  some  half-drunk  ruffian,  who  was  clutching  at  the 
gold  chains  and  trinkets  with  which  she  was  profusely  bedecked, 
after  the  fashion  of  Jewish  women.  The  rascal  had  just  seized  with 
one  hand  her  streaming  black  tresses,  and  with  the  other  a  heavy 
collar  of  gold  which  was  wound  round  her  throat,  when  a  priestjr 


THE  NEW  DIOGENES.  79 

stepping  up,  laid  a  quiet  hand  upon  his  shoulder.  The  fellow,  too 
maddened  to  obey,  turned,  and  struck  hack  the  restraining  arm. . . . 
and  in  an  instant  was  felled  to  the  earth  by  a  young  monk. . . . 

“  Touchest  thou  the  Lord’s  anointed,  sacrilegious  wretch  ?  ”  cried 
the  man  of  the  desert,  as  the  fellow  dropped  on  the  pavement,  with 
his  booty  in  his  hand. 

The  monk  tore  the  gold  necklace  from  his-  grasp,  looked  at  it  for  a 
moment  with  childish  wonder,  as  a  savage  might  at  some  incompre¬ 
hensible  product  of  civilized  industry,  and  then,  spitting  on  it  in  con¬ 
tempt,  dashed  it  on  the  ground,  and  trampled  it  into  the  mud. 

“Follow  the  golden  wedge  of  Achan,  and  the  silver  of  Iscariot, 
thou  root  of  all  evil !  ”  And  he  rushed  on,  yelling,  ‘  ‘  Down  with  the 
circumcision  !  Down  with  the  blasphemers  !  ” — while  the  poor  girl 
vanished  among  the  crowd. 

Raphael  watched  him  with  a  quaint,  thoughtful  smile,  while 
Miriam  shrieked  aloud  at  the  destruction  of  the  precious  trumpery. 

“The monk  is  right,  mother.  If  those  Christians  go  on  upon  that 
method,  they  must  beat  us.  It  has  been  our  ruin  from  the  first,  our 
fancy  for  loading  ourselves  with  the  thick  clay.” 

“  What  will  you  do?”  cried  Miriam,  clutching  him  by  the  arm. 

“  What  will  you  do  ?  ” 

“  I  am  safe.  I  have  a  boat  waiting  for  me  on  the  canal  at  the  gar¬ 
den  gate,  and  in  Alexandria  I  stay ;  no  Christian  hound  shall  make 
old  Miriam  move  afoot  against  her  will.  My  jewels  are  all  buried, — 
my  girls  all  sold  ;  save  what  you  can,  and  come  with  me  !  ” 

“  My  sweet  mother,  why  so  peculiarly  solicitous  about  my  welfare, 
above  that  of  all  the  sons  of  J  udah  ?  ” 

“  Because — because —  No,  I’ll  tell  you  that  another  time.  But  I 
loved  your  mother,  and  she  loved  me.  Come  !  ” 

Raphael  relapsed  into  silence  for  a  few  minutes,  and  watched  the 
tumult  below. 

“  How  those  Christian  priests  keep  their  men  in  order  !  There  is 
110  use  resisting  destiny.  They  are  the  strong  men  of  the  time,  after 
all ;  and  the  little  Exodus  must  needs  have  its  course.  Miriam, 
daughter  of  Jonathan - ” 

“  I  am  no  man’s  daughter  !  I  have  neither  father  nor  mother, 
husband  nor -  Call  me  mother  again  !  ” 

“  Whatsoever  I  am  to  call  you,  there  are  jewels  enough  in  that 
closet  to  buy  half  Alexandria.  Take  them.  I  am  going.” 

“  With  me  ?  ” 

“  Out  into  the  world,  my  dear  lady.  I  am  bored  with  riches. 
That  young  savage  of  a  monk  understood  them  better  than  we  Jews 
do.  I  shall  just  make  a  virtue  of  necessity,  and  turn  beggar.'” 

“Beggar?” 

“Why  not?  Don’t  argue.  These  scoundrels  will  make  me  one, 
whether  I  like  or  not ;  so  forth  I  go.  There  will  be  few  leave-takings. 
This  brute  of  a  dog  is  the  only  friend  I  have  on  earth  ;  and  I  lov® 


80 


HYPATIA. 


her,  because  she  has  the  true  old  dogged,  spiteful,  cuuning,  obstinate 
Maccabee  spirit  in  her, — of  which  if  we  had  a  spark  left  in  us  just 
now,  there  would  be  no  little  Exodus  ;  eh,  Bran,  my  beauty  ?  ’’ 

“  You  can  escape  with  me  to  the  prefect’s,  and  save  the  mass  of 
your  wealth.” 

“  Exactly  what  I  don’t  want  to  do.  I  hate  that  prefect  as  I  hate  a 
dead  camel,  or  the  vulture  who  eats  him.  And  to  tell  the  truth,  I 
am  growing  a  great  deal  too  fond  of  that  heathen  woman  there - ” 

‘‘  What?”  shrieked  the  old  woman, — “Hypatia?” 

“  If  you  choose.  At  all  events  the  easiest  way  to  cut  the  knot  is 
to  expatriate.  I  shall  beg  my  passage  on  board  the  first  ship  to 
Gyrene,  and  go  and  study  life  in  Italy  with  Heraclian’s  ex];)edition. 
Quick, — take  the  jewels,  and  breed  fresh  troubles  for  yourself  with 
them.  I  am  going.  My  liberators  are  battering  the  outer  door 
already.” 

Miriam  greedily  tore  out  of  the  closet  diamonds  and  pearls,  rubies, 
and  emeralds,  and  concealed  them  among  her  ample  robes  : — “  Go  ! 
go  !  Escape  from  her  !  1  will  hide  your  jewels  !  ” 

“  Ay,  hide  them,  as  mother  Earth  does  all  things,  in  that  all- 
embracing  bosom.  You  will  have  doubled  them  before  we  meet 
again,  no  doubt.  Farewell,  mother  !  ” 

“  But  not  forever,  Eaphael  !  not  forever  !  Promise  me,  in  the 
name  of  the  four  archangels,  that,  if  you  are  in  trouble  or  danger, 
you  will  write  to  me,  at  the  house  of  Eudaimon.” 

“  The  little  porter  philosopher,  who  hangs  about  Hypatia’s  lecture- 
room  ?  ” 

“  The  same,  the  same.  He  will  give  me  your  letter,  and  I  swear 
to  you,  I  will  cross  the  mountains  of  Kaf  to  deliver  you  ! — I  will  pay 
you  all  back.  By  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob  I  swear  !  May  my 
tongue  cleave  to  the  roof  of  my  mouth,  if  I  do  not  account  to  you 
for  the  last  penny  !  ” 

“Don’t  commit  yourself  to  rash  promises,  my  dear  lady.  If  1  am 
bored  with  poverty,  I  can  but  borrow  a  few  gold  pieces  of  a  rabbi, 
and  turn  peddler.  I  really  do  not  trust  you  to  pay  me  back,  so  I 
shall  not  be  disappointed  if  you  do  not.  Why  should  I?” 

“  Because — because — 0  God  !  No, — never  mind  !  You  shall  have 
all  back.  Spirit  of  Elias  !  where  is  the  black  agate  !  Why  is  it  not 
among  these  ? — The  broken  half  of  the  black  agate  talisman  ?” 

Raphael  turned  pale.  ‘  ‘  How  did  you  know  that  I  have  a  black 
agate  ?  ” 

“  How  did  I?  How  did  I  not?”  cried  she,  clutching  him  by  the 
arm.  “  Where  is  it  ?  All  depends  on  that  !  Fool  !  ”  she  went  on, 
throwing  him  off  from  her  at  arm’s  length,  as  a  sudden  suspicion 
stung  her, — “  you  have  not  given  it  to  the  heathen  woman?” 

“  By  the  soul  of  my  fathers, then,  you  mysterious  old  witch,  who 
seem  to  know  everything,  that  is  exactly  wbat  I  have  done.” 

Miriam  clapped  her  hands  together  wildly.  “  Lost !  lost  !  lost ! 


TBE  NEW  DIOGENEB. 


81 


No  !  I  will  have  it,  if  I  tear  it  out  of  her  heart !  I  will  be  avenged 
of  her,' — the  strange  woman  who  flatters  with  her  words,  to  whom  the 
simple  go  in,  and  know  not  that  the  dead  are  there,  and  that  her 
guests  are  in  the  depths  of  hell  !  God  do  so  to  me,  and  more  also,  if 
she  and  her  sorceries  be  on  earth  a  twelvemonth  hence  !  ” 

“  Silence,  Jezebel  !  Heathen  or  none,  she  is  as  pure  as  the  sun¬ 
light  !  I  only  gave  it  her  because  she  fancied  the  talisman  upon  it.” 
“  To  enchant  you  with  it,  to  your  ruin  !  ” 

Brute  of  a  slave-dealer  !  you  fancy  every  one  as  base  as  the  poor 
V  letches  whom  you  buy  and  sell  to  shame,  that  you  may  make  them 
i  much  the  children  of  hell,  if  that  be  possible,  as  yourself  !  ” 
Miriam  looked  at  him,  her  large  black  eyes  widening  and  kindling. 
For  an  instant  she  felt  for  her  poniard — and  then  burst  into  an  agony 
of  tears,  hid  her  face  in  her  withered  hands,  and  rushed  from  the 
room,  as  a  crash  and  shout  below  announced  the  bursting  of  the  door. 

‘‘ There  she  goes,  with  my  jewels.  And  here  come  my  guests, 
with  the  young  monk  at  their  head. — One  rising  when  the  other  sets. 
A  worthy  pair  of  Dioscuri  !  Come,  Bran  !.  . .  .Boys  !  Slaves  !  Where 
are  you  ?  Steal  every  one  what  he  can  1  ay  his  hands  on,  and  run  for 
your  lives  through  the  back  gate.” 

The  slaves  had  obeyed  him  already.  He  walked  smilingly  down¬ 
stairs  through  utter  solitude,  and  in  the  front  passage  met  face  to  face 
the  mob  of  monks,  costermongers  and  dock-workers,  fishwives  and  beg¬ 
gars,  who  were  thronging  up  the  narrow  entry,  and  bursting  into 
the  doors  right  and  le  ft ;  and  at  their  head,  alas !  the  young  monk  Who 
had  just  trampled  the  necklace  into  the  mud.  . .  .no  other,  in  fact, 
than  Philammon. 

“  Welcome,  my  worthy  guests  !  Enter,  I  beseech  you,  and  fulfill, 
in  your  own  peculiar  way,  the  precepts  which  bid  you  not  be  over¬ 
anxious  for  the  good  things  of  this  life . For  eating  and  drinking, 

my  kitchen  and  cellar  are  at  your  service.  For  clothing,  if  any  illus¬ 
trious  personage  will  do  me  the  honor  to  change  his  holy  rags  with 
me,  here  are  an  Indian  shawl-pelisse  and  a  pair  of  silk  trousers  at  his 
service.  Perhaps  you  will  accommodate  me,  my  handsome  young 
captain,  clioragus  of  this  new  school  of  the  prophets  ?  ” 

Philammon,  who  was  the  person  addressed,  tried  to  push  by  him\ 
CO  n  t  em  [ )  1 11  o  usly . 

Allow  me,  sir.  I  lead  the  way.  This  dagger  is  poisoned, — a 
scratch  and  you  are  dead.  This  dog  is  of  the  true  British  breed  ;  if 
she  seizes  you,  red-hot  iron  will  not  loose  her,  till  she  hears  the  bone 
crack.  If  any  one  will  change  clothes  with  me,  all  I  have  is  at  your 
service.  If  not,  the  first  that  stirs  is  a  dead  man.” 

There  was  no  mistaking  the  quiet,  high-bred  determination  of  the 
speaker.  Had  he  raged  and  blustered,  Philammon  could  have  met 
him  on  his  own  ground  :  but  there  was  an  easy  self-possessed  disdain 
about  him,  which  utterly  abashed  the  young  monk,  and  abashed,  too, 
the  whole  crowd  of  rascals  at  his  heels. 


HYPATIA. 


“  ril  change  clotlies  with  you,  you  Jewish  dog  !  ”  roared  a  dirty  fel¬ 
low  out  of  the  mob. 

“  I  am  your  eternal  debtor.  Let  us  step  into  this  side  room.  Walk 
up-stairs,  my  friends.  Take  care,  there,  sir  ! — That  porcelain,  whole, 
is  worth  three  thousand  gold  pieces  ;  broken,  it  is  not  three  pence.  I 
leave  it  to  your  good  sense  to  treat  it  accordingly.  Now  tlien,  my 
friend  !  ”  And  in  the  midst  of  the  raging  vortex  of  plunderers,  who 
were  snatching  up  everything  which  they  could  carry  away,  and 
breaking  everything  which  they  could  not,  he  quietly  dive'sted  him¬ 
self  of  his  finery,  and  put  on  the  ragged  cotton  tunic,  and  battered 
straw  hat,  which  the  fellow  handed  over  to  him. 

Philammon,  who  had  had  from  the  first  no  mind  to  plunder,  stood 
watching  Raphael  with  dumb  wonder ;  and  a  shudder  of  regret,  he 
knew  not  why,  passed  through  him,  as  he  saw  the  mob  tearing  down 
pictures,  and  dashing  statues  to  the  ground.  Heathen  they  were, 
doubtless  ;  but  still  the  Nymphs  and  Venuses  looked  too  lovely  to  be 
so  brutally  destroyed . There  was  something  almost  humanly  piti¬ 

ful  in  their  poor  broken  arms  and  legs,  as  they  lay  about  upon  the 

pavement . He  laughed  at  himself  for  the  notion  ;  but  he  could 

not  laugh  it  away. 

Raphael  seemed  to  think  that  he  ought  not  to  laugh  it  away  ;  for 
lie  pointed  to  the  fragments,  and  with  a  quaint  look  at  the  young 
monk, — 

“  Our  nurses  used  to  tell  us, 

‘  If  you  can’t  make  it 
You  ought  not  to  break  it.’” 

**  I  had  no  nurse,”  said  Philammon. 

“Ah  ! — that  accounts — for  this  and  other  things.  Well,”  he  went 
on,  with  the  most  provoking  good-nature,  “  you  are  in  a  fair  road, 
toy  handsome  youth  ;  I  wish  you  joy  of  your  fellow- workmen,  and 
of  your  apprenticeship  in  the  noble  art  of  monkery .  Riot  and  pil¬ 
lage,  shrieking  women  and  houseless  children,  in  your  twentieth 
summer,  are  the  sure  path  to  a  saintship,  such  as  Paul  of  Tarsus, 
who,  with  all  his  eccentricities,  was  a  gentleman,  certainly  never 
contemplated.  I  have  heard  of  Phoebus  Apollo  under  many  dis¬ 
guises,  but  this  is  the  first  time  I  ever  saw  him  in  the  wolfs  hide.” 

“  Or  in  the  lion’s,”  said  Philammon,  trying  in  his  shame  to  make 
a  fine  speech. 

“  Like  the  Ass  in  the  Fable.  Farewell  !  Stand  out  of  the  way, 
friends  !  ’Ware  teeth  and  poison  !  ” 

And  he  disappeared  among  the  crowd,  who  made  way  respectfully 
enough  for  his  dagger  and  his  brindled  companion. 


CHAPTER  VII. 


THOSE  BY  WHOM  OFFENSES  COME. 

Phelammon’s  heart  smote  him  all  that  day,  whenever  he  thought 
of  his  morning’s  work.  Till  then  all  Christians,  monks  above  all, 
had  been  infallible  in  liis  eyes  :  all  Jews  and  heathens  insane  and 
accursed.  Moreover,  meekness  under  insult,  fortitude  in  calamity, 
the  contempt  of  worldly  comfort,  the  worship  of  poverty  as  a  noble 
estate,  were  virtues  which  the  Church  Catholic  boasted  as  her  pecu¬ 
liar  heritage  :  on  which  side  had  the  balance  of  those  qualities  in¬ 
clined  that  morning  ?  The  figure  of  Raphael,  stalking  out  ragged 
and  penniless  into  the  wide  world,  haunted  him,  with  its  quiet,  self- 
assured  smile.  And  there  haunted  him,  too,  another  peculiarity  in 
the  man  which  he  had  never  before  remarked  in  any  one  but  Arse- 
nius, — that  ease  and  grace,  that  courtesy  and  self-restraint,  which 
made  Raphael’s  rebukes  rankle  all  the  more  keenly,  because  he  felt 
that  the  rebuker  was  in  some  mysterious  way  superior  to  him,  and 
saw  through  him,  and  could  have  won  him  over,  or  crushed  him  in 
argument,  or  in  intrigue, — or  in  anything,  perhaps,  except  mere 
brute  force.  Strange,  that  Raphael,  of  all  men,  should  in  those  few 
moments  have  reminded  him  so  much  of  Arsenius  ;  and  that  the  very 
same  qualities  which  gave  a  peculiar  charm  to  the  latter  should  give 
a  peculiar  unloveliness  to  the  former,  and  yet  be,  without  a  doubt, 
the  same.  What  was  it?  Was  it  rank  which  gave  it?  Arsenius 
had  been  a  great  man,  he  knew, — the  companion  of  kings.  And  Ra¬ 
phael  seemed  rich.  He  had  heard  the  mob  crying  out  against  the 
prefect  for  favoring  him.  Was  it  then  familiarity  with  the  great 
ones  of  the  world  which  produced  this  manner  and  tone?  It  was  a 
real  strength,  whether  in  Arsenius  or  in  Raphael.  He  felt  humbled 
before  it, — envied  it.  If  it  made  Arsenius  a  more  complete  and 
more  captivating  person,  why  should  it  not  do  the  same  for  him? 
Why  should  not  he,  too,  have  his  share  of  it? 

Bringing  with  it  such  thoughts  as  these,  the  time  ran  on  till 
noon,  and  the  midday  meal,  and  the  afternoon’s  work,  to  which  Phil- 
ammon  looked  forward  joyfully  as  a  refuge  from  his  own  thoughts. 

He  was  sitting  on  his  sheep-skin  upon  a  step,  basking,  like  a  true 
son  of  the  desert,  in  a  blaze  of  fiery  sunshine,  which  made  the  black 
stone- work  too  hot  to  touch  with  the  bare  hand,  watching  the  swal¬ 
lows  as  they  threaded  the  columns  of  the  Serapeium,  and  tliinking 
how  often  he  had  delighted  in  their  air-dance,  as  they  turned  and 

(83) 


HYPATIA 


84 

tawked  up  and  down  tlie  dear  old  glen  at  Scetis.  A  crowd  of  citi¬ 
zens,  with  causes,  appeals,  and  petitions,  were  passing  in  and  out 
from  tlie  patriarch’s  audience-room,  Peter  and  the  archdeacon  were 
waiting  in  the  shade  close  by,  for  the  gathering  of  the  parabolani, 
and  talking  over  the  morning’s  work  in  an  earnest  whisper,  in  which 
the  names  of  Hypatia  and  Orestes  were  now  and  then  audible. 

An  old  priest  came  up,  and,  bowing  reverently  enough  to  the 
archdeacon,  requested  the  help  of  one  of  the  parabolani.  He  had  a 
sailor’s  family,  all  fever-stricken,  who  must  be  removed  to  the  hos¬ 
pital  at  once. 

The  archdeacon  looked  at  him,  answered  an  off-hand  '‘Very  well,” 
and  went  on  with  his  talk. 

The  priest,  bowing  lower  than  before,  represented  the  immediate 
necessity  for  help. 

“It  is  very  odd,”  said  Peter  to  the  swallows  in  the  Serapeium, 
“  that  some  people  cannot  obtain  influence  enough  in  their  own 
parishes  to  get  the  simplest  good  works  performed  without  torment¬ 
ing  his  holiness  the  patriarch.” 

The  old  priest  mumbled  some  sort  of  excase,  and  the  archdeacon, 
without  deigning  a  second  look  at  him,  said, — “  Find  him  a  man, 
brother  Peter.  Anybody  will  do.  What  is  that  boy — Philammon — 
doing  there?  Let  him  go  with  Master  Hieracas.” 

Peter  seemed  not  to  receive  the  proposition  favorably,  and  whis¬ 
pered  something  to  the  archdeacon. . . . 

“No.  I  can  spare  none  of  the  rest.  Importunate  persons  must 
take  their  chance  of  being  well  served.  Come, — here  are  our  breth¬ 
ren  ;  we  will  all  go  together.” 

“  The  farther  together  the  better  for  the  boy’s  sake,”  grumbled 
Peter,  loud  enough  for  Philammon — perhaps  for  the  old  priest — to 
overhear  him. 

So  Philammon  went  out  with  them,  and  as  he  went  questioned  his 
companions,  meekly  enough,  as  to  who  Raphael  was. 

“  A  friend  of  Hypatia  !  ” — that  name  too  haunted  him  ;  and  he  be¬ 
gan,  as  stealthily  and  indirectly  as  he  could,  to  obtain  information 
about  her.  There  was  no  need  for  his  caution  ;  for  the  very  mention 
of  her  name  roused  the  whole  party  into  a  fury  of  execration. 

“May  God  confound  her,  siren,  enchantress,  dealer  in  spells  and 
sorceries  !  She  is  the  strange  woman  of  whom  Solomon  prophesied.” 

“ It  is  my  opinion,”  said  another,  “that  she  is  the  forerunner  of 
Antichrist.” 

“  Perhaps  the  virgin  of  whom  it  is  prophesied  that  he  will  be 
born,”  suggested  another. 

“  Not  that.  I’ll  warrant  her,”  said  Peter,  with  a  savage  sneer. 

‘  ‘  And  is  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  her  pupil  in  philosophy  ?  ”  asked  Phil¬ 
ammon. 

“  Her  pupil  in  whatsoever  she  can  find  wherewith  to  delude  men’s 
souls,”  said  the  old  priest.  “  The  reality  of  philosophy  has  died  long 


THOSE  BY  WHOM  OEEENSES  COME,  85 

ago,  but  tbe  great  ones  find  it  still  worth  their  while  to  worship  its 
shadow.” 

‘‘  Some  of  them  worship  more  than  a  shadow,  when  they  haunt 
her  house,”  said  Peter.  “  Do  you  think  Orestes  goes  thither  only  for 
philosophy  ?  ” 

“We  must  not  judge  harsh  judgments,”  said  the  old  priest  ;  “  Sy- 
nesius  of  Gyrene  is  a  holy  man,  and  yet  he  loves  Hypatia  well.” 

“  He  is  a  holy  man? — and  keeps  a  wife  ?  One  who  had  the  inso¬ 
lence  to  tell  the  blessed  Theophilas  himself  that  he  would  not  be  made 
bishop  unless  he  were  allowed  to  remain  with  her  ;  and  despised  the 
gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost  in  comparison  of  the  carnal  joys  of  wedlock, 
not  knowing  the  Scriptures,  which  saith  that  those  who  are  in  the 
flesh  cannot  please  God  !  Well  said  Siricius  of  Rome  of  such  men, 
‘  Can  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God  dwell  in  other  than  holy  bodies  ?  ’  No 
wonder  that  such  a  one  as  Synesius  grovels  at  the  feet  of  Orestes’s 
mistress  !  ” 

“Then  she  is  profligate?  ”  asked  Philammon. 

“She  must  be.  Has  a  heathen  faith  and  grace?  And  without 
faith  and  grace,  are  not  all  our  righteousnesses  as  filthy  rags  ?  What 
says  St.  Paul  ? — That  God  has  given  them  over  to  a  reprobate  mind, 
full  of  all  injustice,  uncleanness,  covetousness,  maliciousness,  you 
know  the  catalogue. — Why  do  you  ask  me?” 

“  Alas  !  and  is  she  this  ?  ” 

“  Alas  ! — And  why  alas  !  How  would  the  Gospel  be  glorified  if 
heathens  were  holier  than  Christians  ?  It  ought  to  be  so,  therefore 
it  is  so.  If  she  seems  to  have  virtues,  they,  being  done  without  the 
grace  of  Christ,  are  only  bedizened  vices,  cunning  shams,  the  Devil 
transformed  into  an  Angel  of  light.  And  as  for  chastity,  the  flower 
and  crown  of  all  virtues, — whosoever  says  that  she,  being  yet  a  hea¬ 
then,  has  that,  blasphemes  the  Holy  Spirit,  whose  peculiar  and  highest 
gift  it  is,  and  is  anathema  maranatlia  forever  !  Amen  !  ”  And  Peter, 
devoutly  crossing  himself,  turned  angrily  and  contemptuously  away 
from  his  young  companion. 

Philammon  was  quite  shrewd  enough  to  see  that  assertion  was  not 
identical  with  proof.  But  Peter’s  argument  of  “it  ought  to  be, 
therefore  it  is,”  is  one  which  saves  a  great  deal  of  trouble.  .  .  .and  no 
doubt  he  had  very  good  sources  of  information.  So  Philammon 
walked  on,  sad,  he  knew  not  why,  at  the  new  notion  which  he  had 
formed  of  Hypatia,  as  a  sort  of  awful  sorceress-Messalina,  whose  den 
was  foul  with  magic  rites  and  ruined  souls  of  men.  And  yet  if  that 
was  all  she  had  to  teach,  whence  had  her  pupil  Raphael  learned  that 
fortitude  of  his  ?  If  philosophy  had,  as  they  said,  utterly  died  out, 
then  what  was  Raphael? 

Just  then  Peter  and  the  rest  turned  up  a  side  street,  and  Philam' 
mon  and  Hieracas  were  left  to  go  on  their  joint  errand  together. 
They  paced  on  for  some  way  in  silence,  up  one  street  and  down  an¬ 
other,  till  Philammon,  for  want  of  anything  better  to  say,  asked 
where  they  were  going. 


86 


STPATtA. 


“  Where  I  choose,  at  all  events.  No,  young  man  !  If  1,  a  priest, 
am  to  be  insulted  by  archdeacons  and  readers,  I  won’t  be  insulted  by 
you.” 

“I  assure  you  I  meant  no  harm.” 

“  Of  course  not  ;  you  all  learn  the  same  trick,  and  the  young  ones 
catch  it  of  the  old  ones  fast  enough.  Words  smoother  than  butter, 
yet  very  swords.” 

“  You  do  not  mean  to  complain  of  the  archdeacon  and  his  compan¬ 
ions  ?  ”  said  Philammon,  who  of  course  was  boiling  over  with  pug¬ 
nacious  respect  for  the  body  to  which  he  belonged. 

No  answer. 

‘  ‘  Why  sir,  are  they  not  among  the  most  holy  and  devoted  of  men  ?  ” 

“  Ah — yes,”  said  his  companion,  in  a  tone  which  sounded  very  like 
“Ah — no.” 

“  You  do  not  think  so  ?  ”  asked  Philammon,  bluntly. . 

“You  are  young,  you  are  young.  Wait  a  while  till  you  have  seen 
as  much  as  I  have.  A  degenerate  age  this,  my  son  ;  not  like  the 
good  old  times  when  men  dare  suffer  and  die  for  the  faith.  We  are  too 
prosperous  now-a-days  ;  and  fine  ladies  walk  about  with  Magdalens 
embroidered  on  their  silks,  and  gospels  hanging  round  their  necks. 
When  I  was  young  they  died  for  that  with  which  they  now  bedizen 
themselves.” 

‘  But  I  was  speaking  of  the  parabolani.” 

“  Ah,  there  are  a  great  many  among  them  who  have  not  much 
business  where  they  are.  Don’t  say  I  said  so.  But  many  a  rich  man 
puts  his  name  on  the  list  of  the  guild  just  to  get  his  exemption  from 
taxes,  and  leaves  the  work  to  poor  men  like  you.  Rotten,  rotten, 
my  son  !  and  you  will  find  it  out.  The  preachers,  now — people  used 
to  say — I  know  Abbot  Isidore  did — that  I  had  as  good  a  gift  for  ex¬ 
pounding  as  any  man  in  Pelusium  ;  but  since  I  came  here,  eleven 
years  since,  if  you  will  believe  it,  I  have  never  been  asked  to  preach 
in  my  own  parish  church.” 

“  You  surely  jest !  ” 

“  True,  as  I  am  a  christened  man.  I  know  why, — I  know  why  ; 

they  are  afraid  of  Isidore’s  men  here . Perhaps  they  may  have 

caught  the  holy  man’s  trick  of  plain  speaking, — and  ears  are  dainty 
in  Alexandria.  And  there  are  some  in  these  parts,  too,  that  have 
never  forgiven  him  the  part  he  took  about  those  three  villains — 
Maro,  Zosimus,  and  Martinian,  and  a  certain  letter  that  came  of  it  ; 
or  another  letter  either,  which  we  know  of,  about  taking  alms  for  the 
Churcli  from  the  gains  of  robbers  and  usurers.  ‘  Cyril  never  for¬ 
gets.’  So  he  says  to  every  one  who  does  him  a  good  turn . And  so 

he  does  to  every  one  who  he  fancies  has  done  him  a  bad  one.  So 
here  am  I  slaving  away,  a  subordinate  priest,  while  such  fellows  as 
Peter  the  Reader  look  down  on  me  as  their  slave.  But  it’s  always  so. 
There  never  was  a  bishop  yet,  except  the  blessed  Augustine, — would 
to  Heaven  I  had  taken  my  abbot’s  advice,  and  gone  to  him  at  Hippo  ! 


THOSE  BY  WHOM  OEEeNSHS  COME. 


Si' 


— who  had  not  his  flatterers  and  his  tale-bearers,  and  generally  the 
archdeacon  at  the  head  of  them,  ready  to  step  into  the  bishop’s  place 
when  he  dies,  over  the  heads  of  hard-working  parish  priests.  But 
that  is  the  way  of  the  world.  The  sleekest  and  the  oiliest,  and  the 
noisiest ;  the  man  who  can  bring  in  most  money  to  the  charities, 
never  mind  whence  or  how  ;  the  man  who  will  take  most  of  the 
bishop’s  work  off  his  hands,  and  agree  with  him  in  everything  he 
wants,  and  save  him,  by  spying  and  eavesdropping,  the  trouble  of 
using  his  own  eyes  ;  that  is  the  man  to  succeed  in  Alexandria,  or 
Constantinople,  or  Rome  itself.  Look  now  ;  there  are  but  seven  dea¬ 
cons  to  this  great  city,  and  all  its  priests  ;  and  they  and  the  archdea¬ 
con  are  the  masters  of  it  and  us.  They  and  that  Peter  manage  Cyril’s 
work  for  him,  and  when  Cyril  makes  the  archdeacon  a  bishop,  he  will 

make  Peter  archdeacon . They  have  their  reward,  they  have  their 

reward  ;  and  so  has  Cyril,  for  that  matter.” 

“  How  ?  ” 

“  Why,  don’t  say  I  said  it.  But  what  do  I  care?  I  have  nothing 
to  lose.  I’m  sure,  here.  But  they  do  say  that  there  are  two  ways  of 
promotion  in  Alexandria  :  one  by  deserving  it,  the  other  by  paying 
for  it.  That’s  all.” 

“  Impossible  !  ” 

‘  O,  of  course,  quite  impossible.  But  all  I  know  is  just  this,  that 
when  that  fellow  Martinian  got  back  again  into  Pelusium,  after  being 
turned  out  by  the  late  bishop  for  a  rogue  and  hypocrite  as  he  was, 
and  got  the  ear  of  this  present  bishop,  and  was  appointed  his 
steward,  and  ordained  priest, — I’d  as  soon  have  ordained  that  street- 
dog, — and  plundered  him,  and  brought  him  to  disgrace, — for  I  don’t 
believe  this  bishop  a  bad  man,  but  those  who  use  rogues  must  ex¬ 
pect  to  be  called  rogues, — and  ground  the  poor  to  the  earth,  and 
tyrannized  over  the  whole  city,  so  that  no  man’s  property,  or  reputa¬ 
tion,  scarcely  their  lives,  were  safe  ;  and,  after  all,  had  the  impu¬ 
dence,  when  he  was  called  on  for  his  accounts,  to  bring  the  Church 
in  as  owing  him  money  ;  I  just  know  this,  that  he  added  to  all  his 
other  shamelessness  this,  that  he  offered  the  patriarch  a  large  sum  of 

money  to  buy  a  bishopric  of  him . And  what  do  you  think  the  pa 

triarch  answered  ?  ” 

“  Excommunicated  the  sacrilegious  wretch,  of  course  !” 

“  Sent  him  a  letter  to  say  that,  if  he  dared  to  do  such  a  thing 
again,  he  should  really  be  forced  to  expose  him  !  So  the  fellow, 
taking  courage,  brought  his  money  himself  the  next  time  ;  and  all 
the  world  says  that  Cyril  would  have  made  him  a  bishop  after  all,  if 
Abbot  Isidore  had  not  written  to  remonstrate.” 

“  He  could  not  have  known  the  man’s  character,”  said  poor  Phil- 
ammon,  hunting  for  an  excuse. 

“  The  whole  Delta  was  ringing  with  it.  Isidore  had  written  to 
him  again  and  again.” 

“Surely,  then,  his  wish  was  to  prevent  scandal  and  preserve  the 
unity  of  the  Church  in  the  eyes  of  the  heathen.” 


88 


HYPATIA. 


The  old  man  laughed  bitterly. 

“  Ah,  the  old  story, — of  preventing  scandals  by  retaining  them,  and 
fancying  that  sin  is  a  less  evil  than  a  little  noise  ;  as  if  ^^the  worst  of 
all  scandals  was  not  the  being  discovered  in  hushing  up  a  scandal. 
And  as  for  unity,  if  you  want  that,  you  must  go  back  to  the  good  old 
times  of  Dioclesian  and  Decius.” 

“  The  prosecutors  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  Ay,  boy, — to  the  times  of  persecution,  when  Christians  died  like 
brothers,  because  they  lived  like  brothers.  You  will  see  very  little 
of  that  now,  except  in  some  little  remote  county  bishopric,  which  no 
one  even  hears  of  from  year’s  end  to  year’s  end.  But  in  the  cities  it 
is  all  one  great  fight  for  place  and  power.  Every  one  is  jealous  of 
his  neighbor.  The  priests  are  jealous  of  the  deacons,  and  good  cause 
they  have.  The  county  bishops  are  jealous  of  the  metropolitan,  and 
he  is  jealous  of  the  North  African  bishops,  and  quite  right  he  is. 
What  business  have  they  to  set  up  for  themselves,  as  if  they  were 
infallible?  It’s  a  schism  I  say, — a  complete  schism.  They  are  just 
as  bad  as  their  own  Donatists.  Did  not  the  Council  of  Nice  settle  that 
the  Metropolitan  of  Alexandria  should  have  authority  over  Libya  and 
Pentapolis,  according  to  the  ancient  custom  ?  ” 

“Of  course  he  ought,”  said  Philammon,  jealous' for  the  honor  of 
his  own  patriarchate. 

“  And  the  patriarchs  of  Rome  and  Constantinople  are  jealous  of 
our  patriarch.” 

“Of  Cyril?” 

“  Of  course,  because  he  won’t  be  at  their  beck  and  nod,  and  let 
them  be  lords  and  masters  of  Africa.” 

“  But  surely  these  things  can  be  settled  by  councils  ?  ” 

“  Councils  ?  Wait  till  you  have  been  at  one.  The  blessed  Abbot 
Isidore  used  to  say,  that  if  he  ever  was  a  bishop, — which  he  never 
will  be, — he  is  far  too  honest  for  that, — he  would  never  go  near  one 
of  them  ;  for  he  never  had  seen  one  which  did  not  call  out  every  evil 
passion  in  men’s  hearts,  and  leave  the  question  more  confounded 
with  words  than  they  found  it,  even  if  the  whole  matter  was  not  set¬ 
tled  beforehand  by  some  chamberlain,  or  eunuch,  or  cook  sent  from 
court,  as  if  he  were  an  anointed  vessel  of  the  Spirit,  to  settle  the 
dogmas  of  the  Holy  Catholic  Church.” 

‘  ‘  Cook  ? ” 

“  Why,Valens  sent  his  chief  cook  to  stop  Basil  of  Caesarea  from  op¬ 
posing  the  court  doctrine . I  tell  you,  the  great  battle  in  these  cases 

is  to  get  votes  from  courts  or  to  get  to  court  yourself.  When  I  was 
young,  the  Council  of  Antioch  had  to  make  a  law  to  keep  bishops 
from  running  otf  to  Constantinople  to  intrigue,'  under  pretense  of 
pleading  the  cause  of  the  orphan  and  widow.  But  what’s  the  use  of 
that,  when  every  noisy  and  ambitious  man  shifts  and  shifts,  from 
one  see  to  another,  till  he  settles  himself  close  to  Rome  or  Byzantium, 
and  gets  the  Emperor’s  ear,  and  plays  into  the  hands  of  his  courtiers  ?  ” 


THOSE  BY  WHOM  OFFENSES  COME. 


89 


“  Is  it  not  written,  ‘  Speak  not  evil  of  dignities  ”  said  Philammon, 
in  liis  most  sanctimonious  tone. 

‘  ‘  W ell,  wliat  of  that  ?  I  don’t  speak  evil  of  dignities,  when  I 
complain  of  the  men  who  fill  them  badly,  do  I  ?  ” 

“  I  never  heard  that  interpretation  of  the  text  before.” 

Very  likely  not .  That’s  no  reason  why  it  should  not  be  true  and 
orthodox.  You  will  soon  hear  a  good  many  more  things,  Avhich  are 
true  enough, — though  whether  they  are  orthodox  or  not  the  court 
cooks  must  settle.  Of  course,  I  am  a  disappointed,  irreverent  old 
grumbler.  Of  course  ;  and  of  coarse  too,  young  men  must  needs  buy 
their  own  experience,  instead  of  taking  old  folks’  at  a  gift.  There, 
— use  your  own  eyes,  and  judge  for  yourself.  There  you  may 
see  what  sort  of  saints  are  bred  by  this  plan. of  managing  the  Cath¬ 
olic  Church.  There  comes  one  of  them.  Now  !  I  say  no  more  !  ” 

As  he  spoke,  two  tall  negroes  came  up  to  them,  and  set  down  be¬ 
fore  the  steps  of  a  large  church  which  they  were  passing  an  object  new 
to  Philammon, — a  sedan-chair,  the  poles  of  which  were  inlaid  with 
ivory  and  silver,  and  the  upper  part  inclosed  in  rose-  colored  silk 
curtains. 

“  What  is  inside  that  cage?”  asked  he  of  the  old  priest,  as  the 
negroes  stood  wiping  the  perspiration  from  their  foreheads,  and  a 
smart  slave-girl  stepped  forward,  with  a  parasol  and  slippers  in  her 
hand,  and  reverently  lifted  the  lower  edge  of  the  curtain. 

“  A  saint,  I  tell  you  !  ” 

An  embroidered  shoe,  with  a  large  gold  cross  on  the  instep,  was 
put  forth  delicately  from  beneath  the  curtain,  and  the  kneeling  maid 
put  on  the  slipper  over  it. 

“There  !”  whispered  the  old  grumbler.  “Not  enough,  you  see, 
to  use  Christian  men  as  beasts  of  burden.  Abbot  Isidore  used  to  say, 
— ay,  and  told  Iron,  the  pleader,  to  his  face, — that  he  could  not  con¬ 
ceive  how  a  man  who  loved  Christ,  and  knew  the  grace  which  has 
made  all  men  free,  could  keep  a  slave.” 

“  Nor  can  I,”  said  Philammon. 

“  But  we  think  otherwise,  you  see,  in  Alexandria  here.  We  can’t 
even  walk  up  the  steps  of  God’s  temple  without  an  additional  pro¬ 
tection  to  our  delicate  feet.” 

“  1  had  thought  it  was  written,  ‘  Put  off  thy  shoes  from  off  thy 
feet,  for  the  place  where  thou  standest  is  holy  ground.’  ” 

‘  ‘  Ah  !  there  are  a  good  many  more  things  written  which  we  do  not 
find  it  convenient  to  recollect. — Look  !  There  is  one  of  the  pil¬ 
lars  of  the  Church, — the  richest  and  most  pious  lady  in  Alexandria.” 

And  forth  stepped  a  figure,  at  which  Philammon’s  eyes  opened 
wider  than  they  had  done  even  at  the  sight  of  Pelagia.  Whatever 
thoughts  the  rich  and  careless  grace  of  her  attire  might  have  raised 
in  his  mind,  it  had  not  certainly  given  his  innate  Greek  good  taste 
the  inclination  to  laugh  and  weep  at  once,  which  he  felt  at  this  spec¬ 
imen  of  the  tasteless  fashion  of  an  artificial  and  decaying  civiliza¬ 
tion.  Her  gown  was  stuffed  out  behind  in  a  fashion  which  provoked 


90 


HYPATIA. 


from  tlie  dirty  boys  who  lay  about  the  steps,  gambling  for  pistachios 
on  their  fingers,  the  same  comments  with  which  St.  Clement  had  u])- 
braided  from  the  pulpit  the  Alexandrian  ladies  of  this  day.  The 
said  gown  of  white  silk  was  bedizened,  from  waist  to  ankle,  with 
certain  mysterious  red  and  green  figures,  at  least  a  foot  long,  which 
Philammon  gradually  discovered  to  be  a  representation,  in  the  very 
lowest  and  ugliest  style  of  fallen  art,  of  Dives  and  Lazarus  :  while 
down  her  back  hung,  upon  a  bright  blue  shawl,  edged  with  embroid¬ 
ered  crosses.  Job  sitting,  potsherd  in  hand,  surrounded  by  his  three 
friends, — a  memorial,  the  old  priest  whispered,  of  a  pilgrimage  which 
she  had  taken  a  year  or  two  before,  to  Arabia,  to  see  and  kiss  the 
identical  dunghill  on  which  the  patriarch  had  sat. 

Round  her  neck  hung,  by  one  of  half-a-dozen  necklaces,  a  manu¬ 
script  of  the  Gospels,  gilt-edged  and  clasped  with  jewels  ;  the  lofty 
diadem  of  pearls  on  her  head  carried  in  front  a  large  gold  cross  ; 
while  above  and  around  it  her  hair,  stiffened  with  pomatum,  was 
frizzled  out  half  a  foot  from  a  wilderness  of  plaits  and  curls,  which 
must  have  cost  some  hapless  slave-girl  an  hour’s  work,  and  perhaps 
more  than  one  scolding,  that  very  morning. 

Meekly,  with  simpering  face  and  downcast  eyes,  and  now  and  then 
a  penitent  sigh  and  shake  of  the  head  and  pressure  of  her  hand  on 
her  jeweled  bosom,  tbe  fair  penitent  was  proceeding  up  the  steps, 
when  she  caught  sight  of  the  priest  and  the  monk,  and  turning  to 
them,  with  an  obeisance  of  the  deepest  humility,  entreated  to  be 
allowed  to  kiss  the  hem  of  their  garments. 

“  You  had  far  better,  madam,”  said  Philammon,  bluntly  enough, 
“  kiss  the  hem  of  your  own.  You  carry  two  lessons  there  which  you 
do  not  seem  to  have  learned  yet.” 

In  an  instant  her  face  flashed  up  into  pride  and  fury.  “  I  asked 
for  your  blessing,  and  not  for  a  sermon.  I  can  have  that  when  I  like.” 

“  And  such  as  you  like,”  grumbled  the  old  priest,  as  she  swept  up 
the  steps,  tossing  some  small  coin  to  the  ragged  boj-s,  and  murmur¬ 
ing  to  herself,  loud  enough  for  Philammon’s  hearing,  that  she  should 
“  certainly  inform  the  confessor,  and  that  sl^  would  not  be  insulted 
in  the  streets  by  savage  monks.” 

“  Now  she  will  confess  her  sins  inside, — all  but  those  which  she 
has  been  showing  off  to  us  here  outside,  and  beat  her  breast,  and  weep 
like  a  very  Magdalen  ;  and  then  the  worthy  man  will  comfort  her 
with — ‘  What  a  beautiful  chain  !  And  what  a  shawl  ! — allow  me  to 
touch  it  !  How  soft  and  delicate  this  Indian  wool  ! — Ah  !  if  you 
knew  the  debts  which  I  have  been  compelled  to  incur  in  the  service 

of  the  sanctuary  ! - ’  And  then  of  course  the  answer  will  be,  as, 

indeed,  he  expects  it  should,  that  if  it  can  be  of  the  least  use  in  the 
service  of  the  Temple,  she,  of  course,  will  think  it  only  too  great  an 

honor . And  he  will  keep  the  chain,  and  perhaps  the  shawl,  too. 

And  she  will  go  home,  believing  that  she  lias  fulfilled  to  the  very 
letter  the  command  to  break  off  her  sins  by  almsgiving,  and  only 
sorry  that  the  good  priest  happened  to  hit  :)r  that  particular  gewgaw  !  ” 


THOSE  BY  WHOM  OFFENSES  COME. 


9\ 

“  Wliat,”  asked  Pliilammon  ;  “  dare  slie  actually  not  refuse  such 
importunity  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  From  a  poor  priest  like  me,  stoutly  enough  ;  but  from  a  popular 

ecclesiastic  like  him . As  Jerome  says,  in  a  letter  of  his  I  once 

saw,  ladies  tliink  twice  in  such  cases  before  they  offend  the  city 
newsmonger.  Have  you  anything  more  to  say  ?  ” 

Pliilammon  had  nothing  to  say  ;  and  wisely  held  his  peace,  while 
the  old  grumbler  ran  on, — 

“  Ah,  boy,  you  have  yet  to  learn  city  fashions  !  When  you  are  a 
little  older,  instead  of  speaking  unpleasant  truths  to  a  fine  lady  with 
a  cross  on  her  forehead,  you  will  be  ready  to  run  to  the  pillars  of 
Hercules  at  her  beck  and  nod,  for  the  sake  of  her  disinterested  hete 
toward  a  fashionable  pulpit,  or  perhaps  a  bishopric.  The  ladies  s^- 
tle  that  for  us  here.” 

“  The  women  ?  ” 

“  The  women,  lad.  Ho  you  suppose  that  they  heap  priests  and 
churches  with  wealth  for  nothing?  They  have  their  reward.  Ho 
you  suppose  that  a  preacher  gets  into  the  pulpit  of  that  church  there 
without  looking  anxiously,  at  the  end  of  each  peculiarly  flowery  sen¬ 
tence,  to  see  whether  her  saintship  there  is  clapping  or  not  ?  She, 
who  has  such  a  delicate  sense  for  orthodoxy  that  she  can  scent  out 
Novatianism  or  Origenism  where  no  other  mortal  nose  would  suspect 
it.  She  meets  at  her  own  house  weekly  all  the  richest  and  most 
pious  women  of  the  city,  to  settle  our  discipline  for  us,  as  the  court 
cooks  do  our  doctrine.  She  who  has  even,  it  is  whispered,  the  ear 
of  the  Augusta  Pulcheria  herself,  and  sends  monthly  letters  toiler  at 
Constantinople,  and  might  give  the  patriarch  himself  some  trouble,  if 
he  crossed  her  lioly  will  ?  ” 

“  What !  will  Cyril  truckle  to  such  creatures?” 

“  Cyril  is  a  wise  man  in  his  generation, — too  wise,  some  say,  for  a 
child  of  the  light.  But  at  least,  he  knows  there  is  no  use  fighting 
with  those  whom  you  cannot  conquer  ;  and  while  he  can  get  money 
out  of  these  great  ladies  for  his  almshouses,  and  orphan-houses,  and 
lodging-houses,  and  hospitals,  and  work-shops,  and  all  the  rest  of  it, 
— and  in  that,  I  will  say  for  him,  there  is  no  man  on  earth  equal  to 
him,  but  Ambrose  of  Milan  and  Basil  of  Caesarea, — why,  I  don’t  quar¬ 
rel  with  him  for  making  the  best  of  a  bad  matter ;  and  a  very  bad 
matter  it  is,  boy,  and  it  has  been  ever  since  emperors  and  courtiers 
have  given  up  burning  and  crucifying  us,  and  taken  to  patronizing 
and  bribing  us  instead.” 

Pliilammon  walked  on  in  silence  by  the  old  priest’s  side,  stunned 

and  sickened . “  And  this  is  what  I  have  come  out  to  see, — reeds 

shaken  in  the  wind,  and  men  clothed  in  soft  raiment,  fit  only  for 
king’s  palaces  !”  For  this  he  had  left  the  dear  old  Laura,  and  the 
simple  joys  and  friendships  of  childhood,  and  cast  himself  into  a 
roaring  whirlpool  of  labor  and  temptation  !  This  was  the  harmonious 
strength  and  unity  of  that  Church  Catholic,  in  which,  as  he  had  been 


92 


HYPATIA. 


taught  from  boyhood,  there  was  but  oue  Lord,  one  Faith,  one  Spirit. 
This  was  the  invisible  body,  “  without  spot  or  wrinkle,  which,  fitly 
joined  together  and  compacted  by  that  which  every  member  supplied, 
according  to  the  effectual  and  proportionate  working  of  every  part, 
increased  the  body,  and  enabled  it  to  build  itself  up  in  Love  !  ”  He 
shuddered  as  the  well  known  words  passed  through  his  memory,  and 
seemed  to  mock  the  base  and  chaotic  reality  around  him.  He  felt 
angry  with  the  old  man  for  having  broken  his  dream  ;  he  longed  to 
believe  that  his  complaints  were  only  exaggerations  of  cynic  peevish¬ 
ness,  of  selfish  disappointment  :  and  yet,  had  not  Arsenins  warned 
him?  Had  he  not  foretold,  word  for  word,  what  the  youth  would 
find, — what  he  had  found?  Then  was  Saint  Paul’s  great  idea  an 
empty  and  an  impossible  dream  ?  No  !  God’s  word  could  not  fail  ; 
the  Church  could  not  err.  The  fault  could  not  be  in  her,  but  in  In^r 
enemies  ;  not,  as  the  old  man  said,  in  her  too  great  prosperity,  biff 
in  her  slavery.  And  then  the  words  which  he  had  heard  from  Cyril 
at  their  first  interview  rose  before  him  as  the  true  explanation.  How 
could  the  Church  work  freely  and  healthily  while  she  was  crushed 
and  fettered  by  the  rulers  of  this  world  ?  And  how  could  they  be  any¬ 
thing  but  the  tyrants  and  Antichrists  they  were,  while  they  were 
menaced  and  deluded  by  heathen  philosophy,  and  vain  systems  of 
human  wisdom  ?  If  Orestes  was  the  curse  of  the  Alexandrian  Church, 
then  Hypatia  was  the  curse  of  Orestes.  On  her  head  the  true  blame 
lay.  She  was  the  root  of  the  evil.  Who  would  extirpate  it  ?. . . . 

Why  should  not  he?  It  might  be  dangerous  -  yet,  successful  or 
unsuccessful,  it  must  be  glorious.  The  cause  of  Christianity  wanted 
great  examples.  Might  he  not — and  his  young  heart  beat  high  at  the 
thought, — might  he  not,  by  some  great  act  of  daring,  self-sacrifice, 
divine  madness  of  faith,  like  David’s  of  old,  when  he  w-ent  out 
against  the  giant,  awaken  selfish  and  luxurious  souls  to  a.moble 
emulation,  and  recall  to  their  minds,  perhaps  to  their  lives,  the 
terns  of  those  martyrs  who  were  the  i)ride,  the  glory,  the  heirloom 
of  Egypt?  And  as  figure  after  figure  rose  before  Ins  imagination,  cf 
simple  men  and  weak  women  who  had  conquered  temptation  and 
shame,  torture  and  death,  to  live  forever  on  the  lips  of  men,  and 
take  their  seats  among  the  patricians  of  the  heavenly  court,  with 
brows  glittering  through  all  eternities  with  the  martyr’s  crown.  Ins 
heart  beat  thick  and  fast,  and  he  longed  only  for  an  opportunity  i  o 
dare  and  die. 

And  the  longing  begot  the  opportunity.  For  he  had  hardly  re 
joined  his  brother  visitors  when  the  absorbing  thought  took  woi  d 
again,  and  he  began  questioning  them  eagerly  for  more  information 
about  Hypatia. 

On  that  point,  indeed,  he  obtained  nothing  but  fresh  invective  -, 
but  when  his  companions,  after  talking  of  the  triumph  which  the 
true  faith  had  gained  that  morning,  went  on  to  speak  of  the  great 
overfiow  of  paganism  twenty  years  before,  under  the  patriarch  The- 


THOSE  BY  WHOM  OFFENSES  COME. 


93 


opliilus  ;  of  Olympiodorus  and  liis  mob,  who  held  the  Serapeium  for 
many  days  by  force  of  arms  against  the  Christians,  making  saDies 
into  the  city,  and  torturing  and  murdering  the  prisoners  whom  they 
took  ;  of  the  martyrs  who,  among  those  very  pillars  which  overhung 
theii*  heads,  had  died  in  torments  rather  than  sacrifice  to  Serapis  ; 
and  of  the  final  victory,  and  the  soldier  who,  in  presence  of  the 
trembling  mob,  clove  the  great  jaw  of  the  colossal  idol,  and  snapped 
forever  the  spell  of  heathenism, — Philammon’s  heart  burned  to  dis¬ 
tinguish  himself  like  that  soldier,  and  to  wipe  out  his  qualms  of 
conscience  by  some  more  unquestionable  deed  of  Christian  prowess. 
There  were  no  idols  now  to  break  ;  but  there  was  philosophy, — 
“  Why  not  carry  war  into  the  heart  of  the  enemy’s  camp,  and  beard 
Satan  in  his  very  den  ?  Why  does  not  some  man  of  God  go  boldly 
into  the  lecture-room  of  the  sorceress,  and  testify  against  her  to  her 
face  ?  ” 

Do  it  yourself,  if  you  dare,”  said  Peter.  We  have  no  wish  to 
get  our  brains  knocked  out  by  all  the  profligate  young  gentlemen  in 
the  city.” 

“  I  will  do  it,”  said  Philammon. 

‘  ‘  That  is  if  his  holiness  allows  you  to  make  such  a  fool  of  yourself.’ 

“  Take  care,  sir,  of  your  words.  You  revile  the  blessed  martyrs,* 
from  St.  Stephen  to  St.  Telemachus,  when  you  call  such  a  deed  fool¬ 
ishness.” 

“  I  shall  most  certainly  inform  his  holiness  of  your  insolence.” 

“  Do  so,”  said  Philammon,  who,  possessed  with  a  new  idea, 
wished  for  nothing  more.  And  there  the  matter  dropped  for  the  time. 

*  *  *  -X-  * 

The  presumption  of  the  young  in  this  generation  is  growing  in¬ 
sufferable,”  said  Peter  to  his  master  that  evening. 

“  So  much  the  better.  They  put  their  elders  on  their  mettle  in 
the  race  of  good  works.  But  who  has  been  presuming  to-day?  ” 

“  That  mad  boy  whom  Pambo  sent  up  from  the  deserts  dared  to 
offer  himself  as  champion  of  the  faith  against  Hypatia.  He  actu¬ 
ally  proposed  to  go  into  her  lecture-room  and  argue  with  her  to  her 
face.  What  think  you  of  that  for  a  specimen  of  youthful  modesty 
and  self-distrust  ?  ” 

Cyril  was  silent  awhile. 

“  What  answer  am  I  to  have  the  honor  of  taking  back?  A  month’s 
relegation  to  Nitria  on  bread  and  water?  You,  I  am  sure,  will  not 
allow  such  things  to  go  unpunished  ;  indeed,  if  they  do,  there  is  an 
end  to  all  authority  and  discipline.” 

Cyril  was  still  silent  ;  while  Peter’s  brow  clouded  fast.  At  last 
he  answered, — 

“  The  cause  wants  martyrs.  Send  the  boy  to  me.” 

Peter  went  down,  with  a  shrug  and  an  expression  of  face  which 
looked  but  too  like  envy,  and  ushered  up  the  trembling  youth,  who 
dropped  on  his  knees  as  soon  as  he  entered. 


94 


HYPATIA. 


So  you  wish  to  go  into  the  heathen  woman’s  lecture-room  and 
defy  her  ?  Have  you  courage  for  it  ?  ” 

“  God  will  give  it  me.” 

“You  will  be  murdered  by  her  pupils.” 

“  I  can  defend  myself,”  said  Philammon,  with  a  pardonable  glance 
downward  at  his  sinewy  limbs.  ‘  ‘  And  if  not :  what  death  more 
glorious  than  martyrdom?”  ^ 

Cyril  smiled  genially  enough.  “  Promise  me  two  things.” 

“  Two  thousand,  if  you  will.” 

“  Two  are  quite  difficult  enough  to  keep.  Youth  is  rash  in  prom¬ 
ises,  and  rasher  in  forgetting  them.  Promise  me  that,  whatever 
happens,  you  will  not  strike  the  first  blow.” 

“  I  do.” 

“  Promise  me,  again,  that  you  will  not  argue  with  her.” 

‘  ‘  What  then  ?  ” 

“Contradict,  denounce,  defy.  But  give  no  reasons.  If  you  do, 
you  are  lost.  She  is  subtler  than  the  serpent,  skilled  in  all  the  tricks 
of  logic,  and  you  will  become  a  laughing-stock,  and  run  away  in 
shame.  Promise  me.” 

“Ido.” 

“  Then  go.” 

“When?” 

“  The  sooner  the  better.  At  what  hour  does  the  accursed  woman 
lecture  to-morrow,  Peter  ?  ” 

“  We  saw  her  go  into  the  Museum  at  nine  this  morning.” 

“  Then  go  at  nine  to-morrow.  There  is  money  for  you.” 

“  What  is  this  for  ?”  asked  Philammon,  fingering  curiously  the 
first  coins  which  he  ever  had  handled  in  his  life. 

“  To  pay  for  your  entrance.  To  the  philosopher  none  enters  with¬ 
out  money.  Not  so  to  the  Church  of  God,  open  all  day  long  to  the 
beggar  and  the  slave.  If  you  convert  her,  well.  And  if  not.”.... 
And  he  added  to  liimslf  between  his  teeth,  “  And  if  not,  well  also, 
— perhaps  better.” 

“  Ay  !  ”  said  Peter  bitterly,  as  he  ushered  Philammon  out.  “  Go 
up  to  Kamoth  Gilead,  and  prosper,  young  fool  !  What  evil  spirit 
sent  you  here  to  feed  the  noble  patriarch’s  only  weakness  ?” 

“  What  do  you  mean  ?”  asked  Philammon,  as  fiercely  as  he  dare. 

“  The  fancy  that  preachings,  and  protestations,  and  martyrdoms, 
can  drive  out  the  Canaanites,  who  can  only  be  got  rid  of  with  the 
sword  of  the  Lord  and  of  Gideon.  His  uncle  Theophilus  knew  that 
well  enough.  If  he  had  not,  Olympiodorus  might  have  been  master 
of  Alexandria,  and  incense  burning  before  Serapis  to  this  day.  Ay, 
go,  and  let  her  convert  you  !  Touch  the  accursed  thing,  like  A  chan, 
and  see  if  you  do  not  end  by  having  it  in  your  tent.  Keep  company 
with  the  daughters  of  Midian,  and  see  if  you  do  not  join  yourself  to 
Baalpeor,  and  eat  the  offerings  of  tlie  dead  !  ” 

And  with  this  encouraging  sentence,  the  two  parted  for  the  night. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


THE  EAST  WIND. 

As,  Hypatia  went  forth  the  next  morning,  in  all  her  glory,  with  a 
crowd  of  philosophers  and  philosophasters,  students,  and  fine  gentle, 
men,  following  her  in  reverent  admiration  across  the  street  to  her 
lecture-room,  a  ragged  beggar-man,  accompanied  by  a  huge  and  viL 
lainous-looking  dog,  planted  himself  right  before  her,  and,  extending 
a  dirty  hand,  whined  for  an  alms. 

Hypatia,  whose  refined  taste  could  never  endure  the  sight,  much 
less  the  contact,  of  anything  squalid  and  degraded,  recoiled  a  little, 
and  bade  the  attendant  slave  get  rid  of  the  man  with  a  coin.  Several 
of  the  younger  gentlemen,  however,  considered  themselves  adepts  in 
that  noble  art  of  “  upsetting”  then  in  vogue  in  the  African  universi¬ 
ties,  to  which  we  all  have  reason  enough  to  be  thankful,  seeing  that 
it  drove  Saint  Augustine  from  Carthage  to  Rome  ;  and  they,  in  com¬ 
pliance  with  the  usual  fashion  of  tormenting  any  simple  creature  who 
came  in  their  way  by  mystification  and  insult,  commenced  a  series  of 
personal  witticisms,  which  the  beggar  bore  stoically  enough.  The 
coin  was  offered  him,  but  he  blandly  put  aside  the  hand  of  the  giver, 
and,  keeping  his  pla<?e  on  the  pavement,  seemed  inclined  to  dispute 
Hypatia’s  farther  passage. 

“  What  do  you  want  ?  Send  the  wretch  and  his  frightful  dog 
away,  gentlemen  I  ”  said  the  poor  philosopher,  in  some  trepidation, 

“  I  know  that  dog,”  said  one  of  them  ;  “  it  is  Aben-Ezra’s.  Where 
did  you  find  it  before  it  was  lost,  you  rascal  ?  ” 

“  Where  your  mother  found  you  when  she  palmed  you  off  upon 
her  goodman,  my  child, — in  the  slave-market.  Fair  sibyl,  have  you 
already  forgotten  your  humblest  pupil,  as  these  young  dogs  have, 
who  are  already  trying  to  upset  their  master  and  instructor  in  the 
angelic  science  of  bullying  ?  ” 

And  the  beggar,  lifting  his  broad  straw  hat,  disclosed  the  features 
of  Raphael  Aben-Ezra.  Hypatia  recoiled  with  a  shriek  of  surprise. 

“  Ah  !  you  are  astonished.  At  what,  I  pray  ?  ” 

“  To  see  you,  sir,  thus  !  ” 

“  Why,  then?  You  have  been  preaching  to  us  all  a  long  time  the 
glory  of  abstraction  from  the  allurements  of  sense.  It  augurs  ill, 
surely,  for  your  estimate  either  of  your  pupils  or  of  your  own  elo¬ 
quence,  if  you  are  so  struck  with  consternation  because  one  of  them 
has  actually  at  last  obeyed  you.” 

(95) 


m 


HYPATIA. 


‘‘What  is  the  meaning  of  this  masquerabe,  most  excellent  sir?” 
asked  Hypatia,  and  a  dozen  voices  beside. 

“  Ask  C'yril.  I  am  on  my  way  to  Italy,  in  the  character  of  the  New 
Diogenes,  to  look,  like  him,  for  a  man.  When  I  have  found  one,  I 
shall  feel  great  pleasure  in  returning  to  acquaint  you  with  the  amaz¬ 
ing  news.  Farewell  !  I  wished  to  look  once  more  at  a  certain  coun¬ 
tenance,  though  I  have  turned,  as  you  see.  Cynic  :  and  intend  hence¬ 
forth  to  attend  no  teacher  but  my  dog,  who  will  luckily  charge  no 
fees  for  instruction  ;  if  she  did,  I  must  go  untaught,  for  my  ancestral 
wealth  made  itself  wings  yesterday  morning.  You  are  aware,  doubt¬ 
less  of  a  Plebiscitum  against  the  Jews,  which  w^as  carried  into  effect 
under  the  auspices  of  a  certain  holy  tribune  of  the  people  ?” 

‘  ‘  Infamous  !  ” 

“And  dangerous,  my  dear  lady.  Success  is  inspiriting. ..  .and 
Theon’s  house  is  quite  as  easily  sacked  as  the  Jews’  quarter . Be¬ 

ware.” 

“Come,  come,  Aben-Ezra,”  cried  the  young  men;  “you  are  far 
too  good  company  for  us  to  lose  you  for  that  rascally  patriarch’s 
fancy.  We  will  make  a  subscription  for  you,  eh  ?  And  you  shall  live 
with  each  of  us,  month  and  month  about.  We  shall  quite  lose  the 
trick  of  joking  without  you.” 

“  Thank  you,  gentlemen.  But  really  you  have  been  my  butts  far 
too  long  for  me  to  think  of  becoming  yours.  Madam,  one  word  in 
private  before  I  go.” 

Hypatia  leaned  forward,  and,  speaking  in  Syriac,  whispered  hur¬ 
riedly, — 

“O,  stay,  sir,  I  beseech  you  !  You  are  the  wisest  of  my  pupils, — 
perhaps  my  only  true  pupil . My  father  will  find  some  conceal¬ 

ment  for  you  from  these  wretches  ;  and  if  you  need  money,  re¬ 
member,  he  is  your  debtor.  We  have  never  repaid  you  the  gold 
which - ” 

“  Fairest  Muse,  that  was  but  my  entrance-fee  to  Parnassus.  It  is 
I  who  am  in  your  debt  ;  and  I  have  brouglit  my  arrears,  in  the  form 
of  this  opal  ring.  As  for  shelter  near  you,”  he  went  on,  lowering 
his  voice,  and  speaking,  like  her,  in  Syriac,  “Hypatia  the  Gentile  is 
far  too  lovely  for  the  peace  of  mind  of  Kaphael  the  Jew.”  And  he 
drew  from  his  finger  Miriam’s  ring,  and  offered  it. 

“  Impossible!  ”  said  Hypatia,  blushing  scarlet :  “  I  cannot  accept  it.  ” 

“  I  beseech  you.  It  is  the  last  earthly  burden  I  have,  except  this 
snail’s  prison  of  flesh  and  blood.  My  dagger  will  open  a  crack 
through  that  when  it  becomes  intolerable.  But  as  I  do  not  intend  to 
leave  my  shell,  if  I  can  help  it,  except  just  when  and  how  I  choose  ; 
and  as,  if  I  take  this  ring  with  me,  some  of  Heraclian’s  Circumcel- 
lions  will  assuredly  knock  my  brains  out  for  the  sake  of  it, — I  must 
entreat.” 

“Never  !  Can  you  not  sell  the  ring,  and  escape  to  Synesius?  He 
will  give  you  shelter.” 


THE  EAST  Wmi). 


07 


‘  The  hospitable  hurricane  !  Shelter,  yes  ;  but  rest,  none.  As 
soon  pitch  my  tent  in  the  crater  of  ^tna.  Why,  he  will  be  trying 
day  and  night  to  convert  me  to  that  eclectic  farrago  of  his,  which  h© 
calls  philosophic  Christianity.  Well,  if  you  will  not  have  the  ring, 
it  is  soon  disposed  of.  We  Easterns  know  how  to  be  magnificent, 
and  vanish  as  the  lords  of  the  world  ought,” 

And  he  turned  to  the  philosophic  crowd. 

“Here,  gentlemen  of  Alexandria  !  Does  any  gay  youth  wish  to 
pay  his  debts  once  and  for  all  ? — Behold  the  Rainbow  of  Solomon,  an 
opal  such  as  Alexandria  never  saw  before,  which  would  buy  any  one 
of  you,  and  his  Macedonian  papa,  and  Macedonian  mamma,  and  his 
Macedonian  sisters,  and  horses,  and  parrots,  and  peacocks,  twice 
over,  in  any  slave-market  in  the  world.  Any  gentleman  who  wishes 
to  possess  a  jewel  worth  ten  thousand  gold  pieces,  will  only  need  to 
pick  it  out  of  the  gutter  into  which  I  throw  it.  Scramble  for  it,  ye 
young  Phsedrias  and  Pamphili  !  There  are  Laides  and  Thaides 
enough  about  who  will  help  you  to  spend  it.” 

And  raising  the  jewel  on  high,  he  was  in  the  act  of  tossing  it  into 
the  street,  when  his  arm  was  seized  from  behind  and  the  ring 
snatched  from  his  hand.  He  turned,  fiercely  enough,  and  saw  behind 
him,  her  eyes  flashing  fury  and  contempt,  old  Miriam. 

Bran  sprung  at  the  old  woman’s  throat  in  an  instant  :  but  recoiled 
again  before  the  glare  of  her  eye.  Raphael  called  the  dog  off,  and, 
turning  quietly  to  the  disappointed  spectators, — ■ 

“It  is  all  right,  my  luckless  friends.  You  must  raise  money  for 
yourselves,  after  all  ;  which,  since  the  departure  of  my  nation,  will 
be  a  somewhat  more  difficult  matter  than  ever.  The  overruling 
destinies,  whom,  as  you  all  know  so  well  when  you  are  getting  tipsy, 
not  even  philosophers  can  resist,  have  restored  the  Rainbow  of  Solo¬ 
mon  to  its  original  possessor.  Farewell,  Queen  of  Philosophy ! 
When  I  find  the  man,  you  shall  hear  of  it.  Mother,  I  am  coming 
with  you  for  a  friendly  word  before  we  part,  though,”  he  went  on 
laughing,  as  the  two  walked  away  together,  “  it  was  a  scurvy  trick 
of  you  to  balk  one  of  The  Nation  of  the  exquisite  pleasure  of  seeing 
those  heathen  dogs  scrambling  in  the  gutter  for  his  bounty.” 

Hypatia  went  on  to  the  Museum,  utterly  bewildered  by  this  strange 
meeting,  and  its  still  stranger  end.  She  took  care,  nevertheless,  to 
betray  no  sign  of  her  deep  interest  till  she  found  herself  alone  in  her 
little  waiting-room  adjoining  the  lecture-hall  ;  and  there,  throwing 
herself  into  a  chair,  she  sat  and  thought,  till  she  found,  to  her  sur¬ 
prise  and  anger,  the  tears  trickling  down  her  cheeks.  Not  that 
her  bosom  held  one  spark  of  affection  for  Raphael.  If  there  had 
ever  been  any  danger  of  that,  the  wily  Jew  had  himself  taken  care 
to  ward  it  off,  by  the  sneering  and  frivolous  tone  with  which  he 
quashed  every  approach  to  deep  feeling,  either  in  himself  or  in 
others.  As  for  his  compliments  to  her  beauty,  she  was  far  too  much 
accustomed  to  such  to  be  either  pleased  or  displeased  by  them.  But 
HYPATIA — 4 


MYPATIA. 


OS 

slie  felt,  as  slie  said,  that  she  had  lost  perhaps  ner  only  true  pupil ; 
and  more, — perhaps  her  only  true  master.  For  she  saw  clearly 
enougli,  that  under  that  Silenus’s  mask  was  hidden  a  nature  capable 
of— j^erhaps  more  than  she  dares  think  of.  She  had  always  felt  him 
her  superior  in  practical  cunning  ;  and  that  morning  had  proved  to 
her  what  she  had  long  suspected,  that  he  was  possibly  also  her 
superior  in  that  moral  earnestness  and  strength  of  will  for  which  she 
looked  in  vain  among  the  enervated  Greeks  who  surrounded  her. 
And  even  in  those  matters  in  which  he  professed  himself  her  pupil, 
she  had  long  been  alternately  delighted  by  finding  that  he  alone,  of 
all  her  school,  seemed  thoroughly  and  instinctively  to  comprehend 
her  every  word,  and  chilled  by  the  disagreeable  suspicion  that  he  was 
only  playing  Avitli  her,  and  her  mathematics  and  geometry,  and 
metapliysic  and  dialectic,  like  a  fencer  practicing  with  foils,  while  he 
reserved  his  real  strength  for  some  object  more  worthy  of  him. 
More  than  once  some  paradox  or  question  of  his  had  shaken  her 
neatest  systems  into  a  thousand  cracks,  and  opened  up  ugly  depths 
of  doubt,  even  on  the  most  seemingly  palpable  certainties  ;  or  some 
half-jesting  allusion  to  those  Hebrew  Scriptures,  the  quantity  and 
quality  of  his  faith  in  which  he  would  never  confess,  made  her  in¬ 
dignant  at  the  notion  that  he  considered  himself  in  possession  of  a 
reserved  ground  of  knowledge,  deeper  and  surer  than  her  own,  in 
which  he  did  not  deign  to  allow  her  to  share. 

And  yet  she  was  irresistibly  attracted  to  him.  That  deliberate  and 
consistent  luxury  of  his,  from  which  she  shrunk,  he  had  always 
boasted  that  he  was  able  to  put  on  and  take  off  at  will  like  a  gar¬ 
ment  ;  and  now  he  seemed  to  have  proved  his  words  ;  to  be  a  worthy 
rival  of  the  great  Stoics  of  old  time.  Could  Zeno  himself  have  asked 
more  from  frail  humanity  ?  Moreover,  Eaphael  had  been  of  infinite 
practical  use  io  her.  He  worked  out,  unasked,  her  mathematical 
problems  ;  he  looked  out  authorities,  kept  her  pupils  in  order  by  his 
bitter  tongue,  and  drew  fresh  students  to  her  lectures  by  the  attrac¬ 
tions  of  his  wit,  his  arguments,  and  last,  but  not  least,  his  unrivaled 
cook  and  cellar.  Above  all,  he  acted  the  part  of  a  fierce  and  valiant 
watch-dog  on  her  behalf,  against  the  knots  of  clownish  and  often 
brutal  sophists,  the  wrecks  of  the  old  Cynic,  Stoic,  and  Academic 
schools,  who,  with  venom  increasing;  after  the  W'ont  of  parties,  with 
their  decrepitude,  assailed  the  beautifully  bespangled  card-castle  of 
Neo  Platonism,  as  an  empty  medley  of  all  Greek  philosophies  with 
all  Eastern  superstitions.  All  such  Philistines  had  as  yet  dreaded 
the  pen  and  tongue  of  Raphael  even  more  than  those  of  the  chival¬ 
rous  Bishop  of  Cyrene,  though  he  certainly,  to  judge  from  certain  of 
his  letters,  hated  them  as  much  as  he  could  hate  any  human  being ; 
which  was,  after  all,  not  very  bitterly. 

But  the  visits  of  Synesius  were  few  and  far  between  ;  the  distance 
between  Carthage  and  Alexandria,  and  the  labor  of  his  diocese,  and, 
worse  than  all,  the  growing  dilference  in  purpose  between  him  and 


THE  EAST  WIND. 


99 


liis  beautiful  teaclier,  made  liis  protection  all  but  valueless.  And 
now  Aben-Ezra  was  gone  too,  and  with  him  were  gone  a  thousand 
plans  and  hopes.  To  have  converted  him  at  last  to  a  philosophic 
faith  in  the  old  gods  !  To  have  made  him  her  instrument  for  turning 
back  the  stream  of  human  error  !...  .How  often  had  that  dream 
crossed  her  !  And  now,  who  would  take  his  place  ?  Athanasius  ? 
Synesius  in  his  good-nature  might  dignify  him  with  the  name  of 
brother,  but  to  her  he  was  a  powerless  pedant,  destined  to  die  with¬ 
out  having  wrought  any  deliverance  on  the  earth,  as  indeed  the  event 
proved.  Plutarch  of  Athens?  He  was  superannuated.  Syrianus? 
A  mere  logician,  twisting  Aristotle  to  mean  what  she  knew,  and  he 
ought  to  have  known,  Aristotle  never  meant.  Her  father  ?  A  man 
of  triangles  and  conic  sections.  How  paltry  they  all  looked  by  the 
side  of  the  unfathomable  Jew  ! — Spinners  of  charming  cobwebs.  . .  . 
But  would  the  flies  condescend  to  be  caught  in  them  !  Builders  of 
pretty  houses.  . .  .If  people  would  but  enter,  and  live  in  them  ! 
Preachers  of  superfine  morality.  .  .  .  which  their  admiring  pupils  never 
dreamed  of  practicing.  Without  her,  she  well  knew,  philosophy 
must  die  in  Alexandria.  And  was  it  her  wisdom — or  other  and  more 
earthly  charms  of  hers — which  enabled  her  to  keep  it  aliv^e?  Sick¬ 
ening  thought  !  O  that  she  were  ugly,  only  to  test  the  power  of  her 
doctrines  !.  . . . 

Ho  !  The  odds  were  fearful  enough  already  :  she  would  be  glad  of 
any  help,  however  earthly  and  carnal.  But  was  not  the  work  hope¬ 
less  ?  What  she  Avanted  was  men  who  could  act  Avhile  she  thought. 
And  those  were  just  the  men  Avhom  she  would  find  nowhere,  but, 
— she  knew  it  too  well — in  the  hated  Christian  priesthood.  And  then 
that  fearful  Iphigenia  sacrifice  loomed  in  the  distance  as  inevitable. 

The  only  hope  of  philosophy  was  in  her  despair  ! 

***** 

She  dashed  away  the  tears,  and  proudly  entered  the  lecture-hall, 
and  ascended  the  tribune  like  a  goddess,  amid  the  shouts  of  her  au¬ 
dience. ..  .What  did  she  care  for  them?  Would  they  do  what  she 
told  them  ?  She  was  half  through  her  lecture  before  she  could  rec¬ 
ollect  herself,  and  banish  from  her  mind  the  thought  of  Raphael. 

And  at  that  point  we  will  take  the  lecture  up, 

***** 

“Truth!  Where  is  truth,  but  in  the  soul  itself?  Facts,  objects, 
are  but  phantoms  matter- woven, — ghosts  of  this  earthly  night,  at 
Avhich  the  soul,  sleeping  here  in  the  mire  and  clay  of  matter,  shud¬ 
ders  and  names  its  own  vague  tremors  sense  and  perception.  Yet, 
even  as  our  nightly  dreams  stir  in  us  the  suspicion  of  mysterious  and 
immaterial  presences,  unfettered  by  the  bonds  of  time  and  space,  so 
do  these  Avaking  dreams  Avhich  Ave  call  sight  and  sound.  They  are 
divine  messengers,  whom  Zeus,  pitying  his  children,  eA^en  Avhen  he 
pent  them  in  this  prison-house  of  flesh,  appointed  to  arouse  in  them 
dim  recollections  of  that  real  world  of  souls  Avhence  they  came. 


100 


HYPATIA. 


Awakened  once  to  them  ;  seeing-,  through  the  veil  of  sense  and  fact, 
the  spiritual  truth  of  which  they  are  hut  the  accidental  garment,  con¬ 
cealing  the  very  thing  which  they  make  palpable, —  the  philosopher 
may  neglect  the  fact  for  the  doctrine,  the  shell  for  the  kernel,  the 
body  for  the  soul,  of  which  it  is  but  the  symbol  and  the  vehicle. 
What  matter,  then,  to  the  philosopher  whether  these  names  of  men. 
Hector  or  Priam,  Helen  or  Achilles,  were  ever  visible  as  phantoms  of 
tiesh  and  blood  before  the  eyes  of  men  ?  What  matter  whether  they 
spoke  or  thought  as  he  of  Scios  says 'they  did  ?  What  matter,  even, 
whether  he  himself  ever  had  earthly  life  ?  The  book  is  here, — the 
word  which  men  call  his.  Let  the  thoughts  thereof  have  been  at 
first  whose  they  may,  now  they  are  mine.  I  have  taken  them  to  my¬ 
self,  and  thought  them  to  myself,  and  made  them  parts  of  my  own 
soul.  Nay,  they  were  and  ever  will  be  parts  of  me  ;  for  they,  even 
as  the  poet  was,  even  as  I  am,  are  but  a  part  of  the  universal  soul. 
What  matter,  then,  what  myths  grew  up  around  those  mighty  thoughts 
of  ancient  seers  ?  Let  others  try  to  reconcile  the  Cyclic  fragments, 
or  vindicate  the  Catalogue  of  ships.  What  has  the  philosopher  lost, 
though  the  former  were  proved  to  be  contradictory  and  the  latter  in¬ 
terpolated?  The  thoughts  are  there,  and  ours.  Let  us  open  our 
hearts  lovingly  to  receive  them,  from  whence  soever  they  may  have 
come.  As  in  men,  so  in  books,  the  soul  is  all  with  which  our  souls 
must  deal ;  and  the  soul  of  the  book  is  whatsoever  beautiful,  and 
true,  and  noble,  we  can  find  in  it.  It  matters  not  to  us  whether  the 
poet  was  altogether  conscious  of  the  meanings  whicli  we  can  find  in 
him.  Consciously  or  unconsciously  to  him,  the  meanings  must  be 
there  ;  for  were  they  not  there  to  be  seen,  how  could  wn  see  them? 
There  are  those  among  the  uninitiate  vulgar — and  those,  too,  who  carry 
under  the  philosophic  cloak  hearts  still  uninitiate — who  revile  such  in¬ 
terpretations  as  merely  tlie  sophistic  and  arbitrary  sports  of  fancy.  It 
lies  with  them  to  show  what  Homer  meant,  if  our  spiritual  meanings  be 
absurd  ;  to  tell  the  world  why  Homer  is  admirable,  if  that  for  which 
we  hold  him  up  to  admiration  does  not  exist  in  him.  Will  they  say 
that  the  honor  which  he  has  enjoyed  for  ages  was  inspired  by  that 
which  seems  to  be  his  first  and  literal  meaning  ?  And  more,  will  they 
venture  to  impute  that  literal  meaning  to  him  ?  Can  they  suppose  that 
the  divine  soul  of  Homer  could  degrade  itself  to  write  of  actual  physi- 
ical  feastings,  and  nuptials,  and  dances,  actual  nightly  thefts  of 
horses,  actual  fidelity  of  dogs  and  swineherds,  actual  intermarriages 
between  deities  and  men,  or  that  it  is  this  seeming  vulgarity  which 
has  won  for  him  from  the  wisest  of  every  age  the  title  of  the  father 
of  poetry  ?  Degrading  thought  !  fit  only  for  the  coarse  and  sense- 
bound  tribe  who  can  appreciate  nothing  but  what  is  palpable  to  sense 
and  sight !  As  soon  believe  the  Christian  Scriptures,  when  they  tell 
us  of  a  deity  who  has  hands  and  feet,  eyes,  and  ears,  who  condescends 
to  command  the  patterns  of  furniture  and  culinary  utensils,  and  is 
made  perfect  by  being  born — disgusting  thought  ! — as  the  son  of  a 


THE  EAST  WIEI),  101 

village  maiden,  and  defiling  liimself  with  the  wants  and  sorrows  of 
the  lowest  slaves?” 

“It  is  false  !  blasphemous  !  The  Scriptures  cannot  lie  !  ”  cried  a 
voice  from  the  farther  end  of  the  room. 

It  was  Philammon’s.  He  had  been  listening  to  the  whole  lecture, 
and  yet  not  so  much  listening  as  watching,  in  bewilderment,  the 
beauty  of  the  speaker,  the  grace  of  her  action,  the  melody  of  her 
voice,  and  last,  but  not  least,  the  maze  of  her  rhetoric,  as  it  glittered 
before  his  mind’s  eye,  like  a  cobweb  diamonded  with  dew.  A  sea  of 
new  thoughts  and  questions,  if  not  of  doubts,  came  rushing  in  at 
every  sentence  on  his  acute  Greek  intellect,  all  the  more  plentifully 
and  irresistibly  because  his  speculative  faculty  was  as  yet  altogether 
waste  and  empty,  undefended  by  any  scientific  culture  from  the  in- 
rushing  flood.  For  the  first  time  in  his  life  he  found  himself  face  to 
face  with  the  root  questions  of  all  thought, — “What  ami,  and 
where?”  “  What  can  I  know  ?”  And  in  the  half-terrified  struggle 
with  them,  he  had  all  but  forgotten  the  purpose  for  which  he  entered 
the  lecture -hall.  He  felt  that  he  must  break  the  spell.  Was  she 
not  a  heathen  and  a  false  prophetess  ?  Here  was  something  tangible 
to  attack  ;  and  half  in  indignation  at  the  blasphemy,  half  in  order  to 
force  himself  into  action,  he  had  sprung  up  and  spoken. 

A  yell  arose.  “  Turn  the  monk  out  !  ”  “  Throw  the  rustic  through 
the  window  !  ”  cried  a  dozen  young  gentlemen.  Several  of  the  most 
valiant  began  to  scramble  over  the  benches  up  to  him  ;  and  Philam- 
mon  was  congratulating  himself  on  the  near  approach  of  a  glorious 
martyrdom,  when  Hypatia’s  voice,  calm  and  silvery,  stifled  the  tu¬ 
mult  in  a  moment. 

“  Let  the  youth  listen,  gentlemen.  He  is  but  a  monk  and  a 
plebeian,  and  knows  no  better  ;  he  has  been  taught  thus.  Let  him 
sit  here  quietly,  and  perhaps  we  may  be  able  to  teach  him  other¬ 
wise.” 

And  without  interrupting,  even  by  a  change  of  tone,  the  thread  of 
her  discourse,  she  continued  : — 

‘  ‘  Listen  then,  to  a  passage  from  the  sixth  book  of  the  ‘  Iliad,’  in 
which  last  night  I  seemed  to  see  glimpses  of  some  mighty  mystery. 
You  i^now  it  well  :  yet  I  will  read  it  to  you  ;  the  very  sound  and 
pomp  of  that  great  verse  may  tune  our  souls  to  a  fit  key  for  the  re¬ 
ception  of  lofty  wisdom.  For  well  said  Abamnon  the  Teacher,  that 
‘the  soul  consisted  first  of  harmony  and  rhythm,  and,  ere  it  gave 
itself  to  the  body,  had  listened  to  the  divine  harmony.  Therefore  it 
is  that  when,  after  having  come  into  a  body,  it  hears  such  melodies 
as  most  preserve  the  divine  footstep  of  harmony,  it  embraces  such, 
and  recollects  from  them  that  divine  harmony,  and  is  impelled  to 
it,  and  finds  its  home  in  it,  and  shares  of  it  as  much  as  it  can 
share.’  ” 

And  therewith  fell  on  Philammon’s  ear,  for  the  first  time,  the  mighty 
thunder-roll  of  Homer’s  verse  : — 


HYPATIA. 


“So  spoke  the  stewardess:  but  Hector  rushed 
From  the  house,  the  same  way  back,  down  stately  streets. 
Through  the  broad  city,  to  the  Scaian  gates, 

Whereby  he  must  go  forth  toward  the  plain. 

There  running  toward  h.m  came  Andromache, 

His  ample  dowered  wife,  Eetion’s  child,— 

Eetion  the  great-hearted,  he  who  dwelt 
In  Thebe  under  Places,  and  the  woods 
Of  Places,  ruling  over  Kilic  men. 

His  daughter  wedded  Hector  brazen-helmed. 

And  met  him  then  ;  and  with  her  came  a  maid. 

Who  bore  in  arms  a  playful-hearted  babe, 

An  infant  still,  akin  to  some  fair  star. 

Only  and  well-loved  child  of  Hector’s  house. 

Whom  he  had  named  Scamandrios,  but  the  rest 
Astyanax,  because  his  sire  alone 
Upheld  the  weal  of  llion  the  holy. 

He  smiled  in  silence,  looking  on  his  child: 

But  she  stood  close  to  him,  with  many  tears  ; 

And  hung  upon  his  hand,  and  spoke,  and  called  him. 

“  ‘  My  hero,  thy  great  heart  will  wear  thee  out: 

Thou  pitiest  not  thine  infant  child,  Ilor  me 
The  hapless,  soon  to  be  thy  widow  ; 

The  Greeks  will  slay  thee,  falling  one  and  all 
Upon  thee:  but  to  me  were  sweeter  far. 

Having  lost  thee,  to  die  ;  no  cheer  to  me 

Will  come  thenceforth,  if  thou  shouldst  meet  thy  fate  i 

Woes  only  :  mother  have  I  none,  nor  sire. 

For  that  my  sire  divine  Achilles  slew. 

And  wasted  utterly  the  pleasant  homes 
Of  Kilic  folk  in  Thebe  lofty-walled. 

And  slew  Eetion  with  the  sword  ;  yet  spared 
To  strip  the  dead  :  awe  kept  his  soul  from  that. 

Therefore  he  burned  him  in  his  graven  arms, 

And  heaped  a  mound  above  him  ;  and  around. 

The  damsels  of  the  HUgis  holding  Zeus, 

The  nymphs  who  haunt  the  upland,  planted  elms. 

And  seven  brothers  bred  with  me  in  the  halls. 

All  in  one  day  went  down  to  Hades  there  ; 

For  all  of  them  swift-foot  Achilles  slew 
Beside  the  lazy  kine  and  snow-white  sheep. 

And  her,  my  mother,  who  of  late  was  queen 
Beneath  the  woods  of  Placos,  he  brought  here 
Among  his  other  spoils  ;  yet  set  her  free 
Again,  receiving  ransom  rich  and  great. 

But  Artemis,  whose  bow  is  all  her  joy. 

Smote  her  to  death  within  her  father’s  halls. 

Hector  I  so  thou  art  father  to  me  now. 

Mother,  and  brother,  and  husband  fair  and  strong  I 
O,  come  now,  pity  me,  and  stay  thou  here 
Upon  the  tower,  nor  make  thy  child  an  orphan 
And  me  thy  wife  a  widow  ;  range  the  men 
Here  by  the  fig-tree,  where  the  city  lies 
Lowest,  and  where  the  wall  can  well  be  scaled  ; 

For  here  three  times  the  best  have  tried  the  assault 
Hound  either  Ajax,  and  Idomeneus, 

And  round  the  Atridai  both,  and  Tydeus’  son, 

Whether  some  cunning  seer  taught  the  craft, 

Or  their  own  spirit  stirred  and  drove  them  on.’ 

“  Then  spake  tall  Hector,  with  the  glancing  helm; 

‘  All  this  I  too  have  watched,  my  wife  ;  yet  much 


THE  EAST  WIND. 


t03 


I  hold  in  dread  the  scorn  of  Troian  men 
And  Trojan  women  with  their  trailing  shawls, 

If,  like  a  coward,  I  should  skulk  from  war. 

Beside,  I  have  no  lust  to  stay  ;  I  have  learnt 
Aye  to  be  bold,  and  lead  the  van  of  fight, 

To  win  my  fattier,  and  myself,  a  name. 

For  well  I  know,  at  heart  and  in  my  thought. 

The  day  will  come  when  Bios  the  holy 
Shall  lie  in  heaps,  and  Priam,  and  the  folk 
Of  ashen-speared  Priam,  perish  all. 

But  yet  no  woe  to  come  to  Trojan  men. 

Nor  even  to  Hecabe,  nor  Priam  king. 

Nor  to  my  brothers,  who  shall  roll  in  dust, 

Many  and  fair,  beneath  the  strokes  of  foes. 

So  moves  me,  as  doth  thine,  when  thou  shalt  go 
Weeping,  led  off  by  some  brass-harnessed  Greek, 
Robbed  of  the  daylight  of  thy  liberty. 

To  weave  in  Argos  at  another’s  loom. 

Or  bear  the  water  of  Messeis  home. 

Or  Hypereia,  with  unseemljr  toils. 

While  heavy  doom  constrains  thee,  and  perchance 
The  folk  may  say,  who  see  thy  tears  run  down, 

“  This  was  the  wife  of  Hector,  best  in  fight 
At  Ilium,  of  horse- taming  Trojan  men.” 

So  will  they  say  perchance  ;  while  unto  thee 
Now  grief  wih  come,  for  such  a  husband’s  loss, 

Who  might  have  warded  off  the  day  of  thrall. 

But  may  the  soil  be  heaped  above  my  corpse 
Before  I  hear  thy  shriek  and  see  thy  shame  1  ’ 

”  He  spoke,  and  stretched  his  arms  to  take  the  child. 
But  back  the  child  upon  his  nurse’s  breast 
Shrunk  crying,  frightened  at  his  father’s  looks, 
Fearing  the  prass  and  crest  of  horse’s  hair 
Which  waved  above  the  helmet  terribly. 

Then  out  that  father  dear  and  mother  laughed. 

And  glorious  Hector  took  the  helmet  off. 

And  laid  it  gleaming  on  the  ground,  and  kissed 
His  darling  child  and  danced  him  in  his  arms  ; 

And  spoke  in  praver  to  Zeus,  and  all  the  gods : 

‘Zeu,  and  ye  other  gods,  O  grant  that  this 
My  child,  like  me,  may  grow  the  champion  here 
As  good  in  strength,  and  rule  with  might  in  Troy 
That  men  may  say.  “  The  boy  is  better  far 
Thau  was  his  sire,”  when  he  returns  from  war, 

Bearing  a  gory  harness,  having  slain 
A  foeman,  and  his  mother’s  heart  rejoice.” 

Thus  saying,  on  the  hands  of  his  dear  wife 
He  laid  the  child  ;  and  she  received  him  back 
In  fragrant  bosom,  smiling  through  her  tears.”  * 


*  The  above  lines  are  not  meant  as  a  “  translation,”  but  as  an  humble  attempt  to 
give  the  literal  sense  in  some  sort  of  meter.  It  would  be  an  act  of  arrogance  even 
to  aim  at  success  where  Pope  and  Chapman  failed.  It  is  simply,  1  believe,  impos¬ 
sible  to  render  Homer  into  English  verse  ;  because,  for  one  reason  among  many, 
it  is  impossible  to  preserve  the  pomp  of  sound  which  invest  with  grandeur  his 
most  common  words.  How  can  any  skill  represent  the  rhythm  of  Homeric  Greek 
in  a  language  which— to  take  the  first  verse  which  comes  to  hand— transforms 
'‘boos  megaloio  boeien,”  into  “great  ox’s  hide  ?  ” 


154 


HYPATIA, 


“  Siicli  is  tlie  myth.  Do  you  fancy  that  in  it  Homer  meant  to  hand 
down  to  the  admiration  of  ages  such  earthly  commonplaces  as  a 
mother’s  brute  affection,  and  the  terrors  of  an  infant  ?  Surely  the 
deeper  insight  of  the  philosopher  may  be  allowed,  without  the  re- 
proach  of  fancifulness,  to  see  in  it  the  adumbration  of  some  deeper 
mystery. 

“The  elect  soul,  for  instance, — is  not  its  name  Astyanax,  king  of 
the  city  ;  by  the  fact  of  its  ethereal  parentage,  the  leader  and  lord  of 
all  around  it,  though  it  knows  it  not  ?  A  child  as  yet,  it  lies  upon  the 
fragrant  bosom  of  its  mother  Nature,  the  nurse  and  yet  the  enemy  of 
man, — Andromache,  as  the  poet  well  names  her,  because  she  fights 
with  that  being,  when  grown  to  man’s  estate,  whom  as  a  child  she 
nourished.  Fair  is  she,  yet  unwise  ;  pampering  us,  after  the  fashion 
of  mothers,  with  weak  indulgences  ;  fearing  to  send  us  forth  into  the 
great  realities  of  speculation,  there  to  forget  her  in  the  pursuit  of 
glory,  she  would  have  us  while  away  our  prime  within  the  harem, 
and  "play  forever  round  her  knees.  And  has  not  the  elect  soul  a 
father,  too,  whom  it  knows  not  ?  Hector,  he  who  is  without, — un¬ 
confined,  unconditioned  by  Nature,  yet  its  husband? — the  all-pervad¬ 
ing  plastic  Soul,  informing,  organizing,  whom  men  call  Zeus  the 
lawgiver,  ^Fther  the  fire,  Osiris  the  life-giver;  whom  here  the  poet 
has  set  forth  as  the  defender  of  the  mystic  city,  the  defender  of  har¬ 
mony  and  order  and  beauty  throughout  the  universe  ?  Apart  sits  his 
great  father, — Priam,  the  first  of  existences,  father  of  many  sons, 
the  Absolute  Reason  ;  unseen,  tremendous,  immovable,  in  distant 
glory';  yet  himself  amenable  to'  that  abysmal  unity  which  Homer 
calls  Fate,  the  source  of  all  which  is,  yet  in  Itself  Nothing,  without 
predicate,  unnamable. 

“  From  It  and  for  It  the  universal  Soul  thrills  through  the  whole 
creation,  doing  the  behests  of  that  Reason  from  which  it  overflowed, 
unwillingly,  in  the  storm  and  crowd  of  material  appearances  ;  war¬ 
ring  with  the  brute  forces  of  gross  matter,  crushing  all  which  is  foul 
and  dissonant  to  itself,  and  clasping  to  its  bosom  the  beautiful,  and 
all  wherein  it  discovers  its  own  reflex  ;  impressing  on  it  its  signature, 
reproducing  from  it  its  own  likeness,  whether  star,  or  dsemon,  or  soul 
of  the  elect  ; — and  yet,  as  the  poet  hints  in  anthropomorphic  lan¬ 
guage,  haunted  all  the  while  by  a  sadness, — weighed  down  amid  all 
its  labors  by  the  sense  of  a  fate, — by  the  thought  of  that  First  One 
from  whom  the  Soul  is  originally  descended  ;  from  whom  it,  and  its 
Father  the  Reason  before  it,  parted  themselves  when  they  dared  to 
think  and  act,  and  assert  their  own  free  will. 

“  And  in  the  meanwhile,  alas  !  Hector,  the  father,  fights  around, 
while  his  children  sleep  and  feed  ;  and  he  is  away  in  the  wars,  and 
they  know  him  not, — know  not  that  they  the  individuals  are  but 
parts  of  him  the  universal.  And  yet  at  moments — oh  !  thrice  blessed 
they  whose  celestial  parentage  has  made  such  moments  part  of  their 
appointed  destiny — at  moments  flashes  on  the  human  child  the  in- 


THE  EAST  WIND. 


105 


tuition  of  tlie  unutterable  secret.  In  the  spangled  glory  of  the  sum¬ 
mer  night, — in  the  roar  of  the  Nile-flood,  sweeping  down  fertility  in 
every  wave, — in  the  awful  depths  of  the  temple  shrine, — in  the  wild 
melodies  of  old  Orphic  singers,  or  before  the  images  of  those  gods 
of  whose  perfect  beauty  the  divine  theosophists  of  Greece  caught  a 
fleeting  shadow,  and  with  the  sudden  might  of  artistic  ecstasy  smote 
it,  as  by  an  enchanter’s  wand,  into  an  eternal  sleep  of  snowy  stone, — 
in  these  there  flashes  on  the  inner  eye  a  vision  beautiful  and  terrible, 
of  a  force,  an  energy,  a  soul,  an  idea,  one  and  yet  million-fold,  rush¬ 
ing  through  all  created  things,  like  the  wind  across  a  lyre,  thrilling 
the  strings  into  celestial  harmony, — one  life-blood  through  the  million 
veins  of  the  universe,  from  one  great  unseen  heart,  whose  thunderous 
pulses  the  mind  hears  far  away,  beating  forever  in  the  abysmal  soli¬ 
tude,  beyond  the  heavens  and  the  galaxies,  beyond  the  spaces  and  the 
times,  themselves  but  veins  and  runnels  from  its  all-teeming  sea. 

“Happy,  thrice  happy,  they  who  once  have  dared,  even  though 
breathless,  blinded  with  tears  of  awful  joy,  struck  down  upon  their 
knees  in  utter  helplessness,  as  they  feel  themselves  but  dead  leaves 
in  the  wind  which  sweeps  the  universe, — happy  they  who  have  dared 
to  gaze,  if  but  for  an  instant,  on  the  terror  of  that  glorious  pageant 
who  have  not,  like  the  young  Astyanax,  clung  shrieking  to  the  breast 
of  mother  Nature,  scared  by  the  heaven- wide  flash  of  Hector’s  arms, 
and  the  glitter  of  his  rainbow-crest !  Happy,  thrice  happy  !  even 
though  their  eyeballs,  blasted  by  excess  of  light,  wither  to  ashes  in 
their  sockets  !  —  Were  it  not  a  noble  end  to  have  seen  Zeus,  and  die 
like  Semele,  burned  up  by  his  glory  ?  Happy,  thrice  happy  !  thoagh 
their  mind  reel  from  the  divine  intoxication,  and  the  hogs  of  Circe 
call  them  henceforth  madmen  and  enthusiasts.  Enthusiasts  they  are  ; 
for  Deity  is  in  them,  and  they  in  It.  For  the  time,  this  burden  of 
individuality  vanishes,  and,  recognizing  themselves  as  portions  of  the 
universal  Soul,  they  rise  upward,  through  and  beyond  that  Reason 
from  whence  the  soul  proceeds,  to  the  fount  of  all, — the  ineffable  and 
Supreme  One, —  and  seeing  It,  become  by  that  act  j)ortions  of  Its 
essence.  They  speak  no  more,  but  it  speaks  in  them,  and  their 
whole  being,  transmuted  by  that  glorious  sunlight  into  whose  rays 
they  have  dared,  like  the  eagle,  to  gaze  without  shrinking,  becomes 
an  harmonious  vehicle  for  the  words  of  Deity,  and,  passive  itself, 
utters  the  secrets  of  the  immortal  gods.  What  wonder  if  to  the  brute 

mass  they  seem  as  dreamers?  Be  it  so . Smile  if  you  will. 

But  ask  me  not  to  teach  you  things  unspeakable,  above  all  sciences, 
which  the  word- battle  of  dialectic,  the  discursive  struggles  of  reason, 
can  never  reach,  but  which  must  be  seen  only,  and  when  seen,  con¬ 
fessed  to  be  unspeakable.  Hence,  thou  disputer  of  the  Academy  !  — 
hence,  thou  sneering  Cynic  ! — hence,  thou  sense-worshiping  Stoic, 
who  fanciest  that  the  soul  is  to  derive  her  knowledge  from  those 

material  appearances  which  she  herself  creates  !  . . . .  hence - ; 

and  yeC  no  ;  stay  and  sneer,  if  you  will.  It  is  but  a  little  time,  a 


106 


HYPATIA. 


few  days  longer  in  tliis  prison-liouse  of  our  degradation,  and  each  thing 
shall  return  to  its  own  fountain  ;  the  hlood-drop  to  the  abysmal  heart, 
and  the  water  to  the  river,  and  the  river  to  the  shining  sea  ;  and  the 
dew-drop  which  fell  from  heaven  shall  rise  to  heaven  again,  shaking 
off  the  dust-grains  which  weighed  it  down,  thawed  from  the  earth- 
frost  which  chained  it  here  to  herb  and  sward,  upward  and  upward 
ever  through  stars  and  suns,  through  gods,  and  through  the  parents 
of  the  gods,  purer  and  purer  through  successive  lives,  till  it  enters 
The  Nothing,  which  is  The  All,  and  finds  its  home  at  last.”. . . . 

And  the  speaker  stopped  suddenly,  her  eyes  glistening  with  tears, 
her  whole  figure  trembling  and  dilating  with  rapture.  She  remained 
for  a  moment  motionless,  gazing  earnestly  at  her  audience,  as  if 
in  hopes  of  exciting  in  them  some  kindred  glow  ;  and  then,  recover¬ 
ing  herself,  added  in  a  more  tender  tone,  not  quite  unmixed  with 
sadness,— 

“  Go  now,  my  pupils.  Hypatia  has  no  more  for  you  to-day.  Go 
now,  and  spare  her  at  least — woman  as  she  is  after  all — the  shame 
of  finding  that  she  has  given  you  too  much,  and  lifted  the  veil  of  Isis 
before  eyes  which  are  not  enough  purified  to  behold  the  glory  of  the 
goddess.  —  Farewell !  ” 

She  ended  :  and  Philammon,  the  moment  that  the  spell  of  her 
voice  was  taken  off  him,  sprung  up,  and  hurried  out  through  the 
corridor  into  the  street . 

So  beautiful !  So  calm  and  merciful  to- him  !  So  enthusiastic  to¬ 
ward  all  which  was  noble  !  Had  not  she,  too,  spoken  of  the  unseen 
world,  of  the  hope  of  immortality,  of  the  conquest  of  the  spirit  over 
the  fiesh,  just  as  a  Christian  might  have  done  ?  Was  the  gulf  be¬ 
tween  them  so  infinite  ?  If  so,  why  had  her  aspirations  awakened 
echoes  in  his  own  heart, — echoes,  too,  just  such  as  the  prayers  and 
lessons  of  the  Laura  used  to  awaken?  If  the  fruit  was  so  like,  must 
not  the  root  be  like  also ?...  .Could  that  be  a  counterfeit?  that  a 
minister  of  Satan  in  the  robes  of  an  angel  of  Light  ?  Light,  at 
least,  it  was,  —  purity,  simplicity,  courage,  earnestness,  tenderness, 

flashed  out  from  eye,  lip,  gesture . A  heathen,  who  disbelieved  ? 

....  What  was  the  meaning  of  it  all  ? 

But  the  finishing  stroke  yet  remained  which  was  to  complete  the 
utter  confusion  of  liis  mind.  For  before  he  had  gone  fifty  yards  up 
the  street,  his  little  friend  of  the  fruit-basket,  whom  he  had  not  seen 
since  he  vanished  under  the  feet  of  the  mob,  in  the  gateway  of  the 
theater,  clutched  him  by  the  arm  and  burst  forth,  breathless  with 
running, — 

‘  ‘  The  —  gods  —  heap  their  favors  —  on  those  who  —  who  least 
deserve  them  !  Rash  and  insolent  rustic  !  And  this  is  the  reward  of 
thy  madness  !  ” 

“  Off  with  you  !”  said  Philammon,  who  had  no  mind  at  the  moment 
to  renew  his  acquaintance  w'th  the  little  porter.  But  the  guardian  of 
pari>5ols  kept  a  firm  bold  on  his  sheep-skin. 


THE  EAST  WIND. 


107 


t 

'^Fool !  Hypatia  lierself  commands  !  Yes,  you  will  see  her,  have 
speech  with  her  !  while  I — I,  the  illuminated, — I,  the  appreciating, 
^ — I,  the  obedieiit, — I,  the  adoring, — who  for  these  three  years  past 
have  groveled  in  tlie  kennel,  that  the  hem  of  her  garment  might 
touch  the  tip  of  my  little  finger, — I — I — I —  ” 

^  “  What  do  you  w^ant,  madman  ?  ” 

“She  calls  for  thee,  insensate  wretch  !  Theon  sent  me, — breath¬ 
less  at  once  with  running  and  envy  —  Go  !  favorite  with  the  unjust 
gods 

“  Who  is  Theon  ?  ” 

“  Her  father,  ignorant  !  He  commands  thee  to  be  at  her  house  — 
here — opposite — to-morrow  at  the  third  hour.  Hear  and  obey ! 
There  !  they  are  coming  out  of  the  Museum,  and  all  the  parasols  will 
get  wrong  !  O  miserable  me  !  ” 

And  the  poor  little  fellow  rushed  back  again,  while  Philammon,  at 
his  wits’  end  between  dread  and  longing,  started  off,  and  ran  the 
whole  way  home  to  the  Serapeiura,  regardless  of  carriages,  elephants, 
and  foot-passengers  ;  and,  having  been  knocked  down  by  a  surly 
porter,  and  left  a  piece  of  his  sheep-skin  between  the  teeth  of  a 
spiteful  camel, — neither  of  which  insults  he  had  time  to  resent, — 
arrived  at  the  archbishop’s  house,  found  Peter  the  Reader,  and  treua* 
blinglv  begged  an  ^adienoe  from  Cyril. 


CHAPTER  IX. 


THE  SNAPPING  OF  THE  BOW. 

Cyril  heard  Pliilammon’s  story  and  Hypatia’s  message  with  a  quiet 
smile,  and  then  dismissed  the  youth  to  an  afternoon  of  labor  in  the 
city,  commanding  him  to  mention  no  word  of  what  had  happened, 
and  to  come  to  him  that  evening  and  receive  his  order,  when  he  should 
have  had  time  to  think  over  the  matter.  So  forth  Philammon  went 
with  his  companions,  through  lanes  and  alleys  hideous  with  filth  and 
poverty,  compulsory  idleness  and  native  sin.  Fearfully  real  and  prac¬ 
tical  it  all  was  ;  but  he  saw  it  all  dimly,  as  in  a  dream.  Before  his 
eyes  one  face  was  shining  ;  in  his  ears  one  silvery  voice  was  ringing. 
. . . .  “  He  is  a  monk,  and  knows  no  better.”. . .  .True  !  And  how  should 
he  know  better  ?  How  could  he  tell  how  much  more  there  was  to 
know,  in  that  great  new  universe,  in  such  a  cranny  whereof  his  life  had 
till  now  been  passed?  He  had  heard  but  one  side  already.  What  if 
there  were  two  sides  ?  Had  he  not  a  right — that  is,  was  it  not  proper, 
fair,  prudent,  that  he  should  hear  both,  and  then  judge? 

Cyril  had  hardly,  perhaps,  done  wisely  for  the  youth,  in  sending 
him  out  about  the  practical  drudgery  of  benevolence,  before  deciding 
for  him  what  was  his  duty  with  regard  to  Hypatia’s  invitation.  He 
had  not  calculated  on  the  new  thoughts  which  were  tormenting  the 
young  monk  ;  perhaps  they  would  have  been  unintelligible  to  him, 
had  he  known  of  them.  Cyril  had  been  bred  up  under  the  most  stern 
dogmatic  training,  in  those  vast  monastic  establishments  which  had 
arisen  amid  the  neighboring  saltpeter  quarries  of  Nitria,  where  thou¬ 
sands  toiled  in  voluntary  poverty  and  starvation  at  vast  bakeries, 
dyeries,  brick-fields,  tailors’  shops,  carpenters’  yards  ;  and  expended 
the  profits  of  their  labor,  not  on  themselves,  for  they  had  need  of 
nothing,  but  on  churches,  hospitals  and  alms.  Educated  in  that 
world  of  practical  industrial  productions  as  well  as  of  religious  exer¬ 
cise,  which  by  its  proximity  to  the  great  city  accustomed  monks  to 
that  world  which  they  despised  ;  entangled  from  boyhood  in  the  in¬ 
trigues  of  his  fierce  and  ambitious  uncle,  Thophilus,  Cyril  had  suc¬ 
ceeded  him  in  the  patriarchate  of  Alexandria  without  having  felt  a 
doubt,  and  stood  free  to  throw  his  fiery  energy  and  clear  practical 
intellect  into  the  cause  of  the  Church  without  scruple,  even,  where 
necessary,  without  pity.  How  could  such  a  man  sympathize  with 
the  poor  boy  of  twenty,  suddenly  dragged  forth  from  the  quiet  cav¬ 
ern-shadow  of  the  Laura  into  the  full  blaze  and  roar  of  the  world’s 

( 108  ) 


THE  SNAPPING  OF  THE  BOW. 


109 


noonday  ?  He,  too,  was  cloister-bred.  But  the  busy  and  fanatic  at¬ 
mosphere  of  Nitria,  where  every  nerve  of  soul  and  body  was  kept  on 
a  life-long  artificial  strain,  without  rest,  without  simplicity,  without 
human  affection,  was  utterly  antipodal  to  the  government  of  the  remote 
and  needy,  though  no  less  industrious  commonwealths  of  Coenobites, 
who  dotted  the  lonely  mountain-glens,  far  up  into  the  heart  of  the 
Nubian  desert.  In  such  a  one  Philammon  had  received,  from  a  ven¬ 
erable  man,  a  mother’s  sympathy  as  well  as  a  father’s  care  ;  and  now 
he  yearned  for  the  encouragement  of  a  gentle  voice,  for  the  greeting 

of  a  kindly  eye,  and  was  lonely  and  sick  at  heart . And  still 

Hypatia’s  voice  haunted  his  ears,  like  a  strain  of  music,  and  would 
not  die  away.  That  lofty  enthusiasm,  so  sweet  and  modest  in  its 
grandeur,  that  tone  of  pity — in  one  so  lovely  it  could  not  be  called 
contempt — for  the  many  ;  that  delicious  phantom  of  being  an  elect 

spirit, . .  .unlike  the  crowd . “  And  am  I  altogether  like  the  crowd?’' 

said  Philammon  to  himself,  as  he  staggered  along  under  the  weight 
of  a  groaning  fever-patient.  “  Can  there  be  found  no  fitter  work  for 
me  than  this,  which  any  porter  from  the  quay  might  do  as  well  ?  Am 
I  not  somewhat  wasted  on  such  toil  as  this?  Have  I  not  an  intellect, 
a  taste,  a  reason  ?  I  could  appreciate  what  she  said.  Why  should  not 
my  faculties  be  educated  ?  Why  am  I  only  to  be  shut  out  from  knowl¬ 
edge  ?  There  is  a  Christian  Griiosis  as  well  as  a  heathen  one.  What 
was  permissible  to  Clement  ” — he  had  nearly  said  to  Origen,  but 
cheeked  himself  on  the  edge  of  heresy — ‘Ms  surely  lawfnl  for  me. 
Is  not  my  craving  for  knowledge  a  sign  that  I  am  capable  of  it? 
Surely  my  sphere  is  the  study,  rather  than  the  street  !  ” 

And  then  his  fellow-laborers — he  could  not  deny  it  to  himself — ■ 
began  to  grow  less  venerable  in  his  eyes.  Let  him  try  as  he  might 
to  forget  the  old  priest’s  grumblings  and  detractions,  the  fact  was 
before  him.  The  men  were  coarse,  fierce,  noisy.  . .  .so  different  from 
her  !  Their  talk  seemed  mere  gossip, — scandalous,  too,  and  hard- 
judging,  most  of  it  ;  about  that  man’s  private  ambition,  and  that 
woman’s  proud  look  ;  and  who  had  stayed  for  the  Eucharist  the 
Sunday  before,  and  who  had  gone  out  after  the  sermon  ;  and  how  the 
majority  who  did  not  stay  could  possibly  dare  to  go,  and  how  the 

minority  who  did  not  go  could  possibly  dare  to  stay Endless 

suspicions,  sneers,  complaints  ....  what  did  they  care  for  the  eternal 
glories  and  the  beatific  vision  ?  Their  one  test  for  all  men  and  things, 
from  the  patriarch  to  the  prefect,  seemed  to  be, — Did  he  or  it  advance 
the  cause  of  the  Church? — which  Philammon  soon  discovered  to 
mean  their  own  cause,  their  influence,  their  self-glorification.  And 
the  poor  boy,  as  his  faculty  for  fault-finding  quickened  under  the 
[  influence  of  theirs,  seemed  to  see,  under  the  humble  stock-phrases  in 

I  which  they  talked  of  their  labors  of  love,  and  the  future  reward  of 

their  present  humiliations,  a  deep  and  hardly-hidden  pride,  a  faith  in 
their  own  infallibility,  a  contemptuous  impatience  of  every  man, 
however  venerable,  who  differed  from  their  party  on  any,  the  slight- 


110 


HYPATIA. 


est,  matter.  They  spoke  with  sneers  of  Augustine’s  Latinizing 
tendencies,  and  with  open  execrations  of  Chrysostom,  as  the  vilest 
and  most  impious  of  schismatics  ;  and,  for  aught  Philammon  knew, 
they  were  right  enough.  But  when  they  talked  of  wars  and  desola¬ 
tion  past  and  impending,  without  a  word  of  pity  for  the  slain  and 
ruined,  as  a  just  judgment  of  Heaven  upon  heretics  and  heathens  ; 
when  they  argued  over  the  awful  struggle  for  power  which,  as  he 
gathered  from  their  words,  was  even  then  pending  between  the 
Emperor  and  the  Count  of  Africa,  as  if  it  contained  but  one  question 
of  interest  to  them, — Would  Cyril,  and  they  as  his  body-guard,  gain 
or  lose  power  in  Alexandria?  and  lastly,  when,  at  some  mention  of 
Orestes,  and  of  Hypatia  as  his  counselor,  they  broke  out  into  open 
imprecations  of  God’s  curse,  and  comforted  themselves  with  the  pros¬ 
pect  of  everlasting  torment  for  both  ;  —  he  shuddered  and  asked  him¬ 
self  involuntarily.  Were  these  the  ministers  of  a  Gospel?  Were 
these  the  fruits  of  Christ’s  Spirit?.  .  .  .And a  whisper  thrilled  through 
the  inmost  depth  of  his  soul, — “  Is  there  a  Gospel  ?  Is  there  a  Spirit 
of  Christ  ?  Would  not  their  fruits  be  different  from  these  ?  ” 

Faint,  and  low,  and  distant,  was  that  whisper  ;  like  the  mutter  of 
an  earthquake  miles  below  the  soil.  And  yet,  like  the  earthquake- 
roll,  it  had  in  that  one  moment  jarred  every  belief,  and  hope,  and 

memory  of  his  being  each  a  hair’s  breadth  from  its  place . Only  one 

hair’s  breadth.  But  that  was  enough  ;  his  whole  inward  and  out¬ 
ward  world  changed  shape,  and  cracked  at  every  joint.  What  if  it 
were  to  fall  in  pieces?  His  brain  reeled  with  the  thought.  He 
doubted  his  own  identity.  The  very  light  of  heaven  had  altered  its 
hue.  Was  the  firm  ground  on  which  he  stood  after  all  no  solid  real¬ 
ity,  but  a  fragile  shell  which  covered — what? 

The  nightmare  vanished,  and  he  breathed  once  more.  What  a 
strange  dream  !  The  sun  and  the  exertion  must  have  made  him 
giddy.  He  would  forget  all  about  it. 

Weary  with  labor,  and  still  wearier  with  thought,  he  returned  that 
evening,  longing,  and  yet  dreading,  to  be  permitted  to  speak  with 
Hypatia.  He  half  hoped  at  moments  that  Cyril  might  think  him  too 
weak  for  it  ;  and  the  next,  all  his  pride  and  daring,  not  to  say  his 
faith  and  hope,  spurred  him  on.  Might  he  but  face  the  terrible 
enchantress,  and  rebuke  her  to  her  face  !  And  yet,  so  lovely,  so 
noble  as  she  looked  !  Could  he  speak  to  her  except  in  tones  of  gentle 
warning,  pity,  counsel,  entreaty?  Might  he  not  convert  her, — save 
her  ?  Glorious  thought  !  To  win  such  a  soul  to  the  true  cause  !  To 
be  able  to  show,  as  the  first  fruits  of  his  mission,  the  very  champion 
of  heathendom  !  It  was  worth  while  to  have  lived  only  to  do  that  ; 
and  having  done  it,  to  die. 

The  archbishop’s  lodgings,  when  he  entered  them,  were  in  a  state 
of  ferment  even  greater  than  usual.  Groups  of  monks,  priests,  par. 
abolani,  and  citizens,  rich  and  poor,  were  hanging  about  the  court 
yard,  talking  earnestly  and  angrily.  A  large  party  of  monks  fresh 


Ill 


"^THE  SNAPPING  OF  THE  BOW. 

from  Nitria,  with  ragged  hair  and  beards,  and  the  peculiar  expression 
of  countenance  which  fanatics  of  all  creeds  acquire,  fierce  and  yet 
abject,  self-conscious  and  yet  ungoverned,  silly  and  yet  sly,  with 
features  coarsened  and  degraded  by  continual  fasting  and  self-tor¬ 
ture,  prudishly  shrouded  from  head  to  heel  in  their  long,  rago-ed 
gowns.  Were  gesticulating  wildly  and  loudly,  and  calling  on  their 
more  peaceable  companions,  in  no  measured  terms,  to  revenue  some 
insult  offered  to  the  Church. 

“What  is  the  matter  !”  asked  Philammon  of  a  quiet,  portly  citi¬ 
zen,  who  stood  looking  up,  with  a  most  perplexed  visage,  at  the  win¬ 
dows  of  the  patriarch’s  apartments, 

‘‘  Don’t  ask  me  ;  I  have  nothing  to  do  with  it.  Why  does  not  his 
holiness  come  out  and  speak  to  them  ?  Blessed  Virgin,  mother  of 

God  !  that  we  were  well  through  it  all  ! - ” 

Cowaid  !  bawled  a  monk  in  his  ear,  “  These  shopkeepers  care 
for  nothing  but  seeing  their  stalls  safe.  Rather  than  lose  a  day’s 
custom,  they  would  give  the  very  churches  to  be  plundered  by  the 
heathen  !  ” 

“  We  do  not  waat  them  !  ”  cried  another.  “  We  managed  Dioscu- 
rqs  and  his  brother,  and  we  can  manage  Orestes.  What  matter  what 
answ^er  he  sends  ?  The  Devil  shall  have  his  own  !  ” 

“They  ought  to  have  been  back  two  hours  ago  ;  they  are  murdered 
by  this  time.  ” 

“  He  would  not  dare  to  touch  the  archdeacon  !  ” 

“  He  will  dare  anytliing.  Cyril  should  never  h&ve  sent  them  forth 
as  lambs  among  wolves.  What  necessity  w^as  there  for  letting  the 
prefect  know  that  the  Jews  were  gone?  He  would  have  found  it  out 
:  for  himself  fast  enough,  the  next  time  he  wanted  to  borrow  money  !  ” 

^  W^hat  is  all  this  about,  reverend  sir?”  asked  Philammon  of 
j  Peter  the  Reader,  who  made  his  appearance  at  that  moment  in  the 
quadrangle,  w'alking  wdtli  great  strides,  like  the  soul  of  Agamemnon 

across  the  meads  of  Asj)hodel,  and  apparently  beside  himself  with 
.  rage, 

“Ah  !  you  here?  You  may  go  to-morrow,  young  fool  !  The  patri¬ 
arch  can’t  talk  to  you.  Why  should  he?  Some  people  have  a  great 
deal  too  much  notice  taken  of  them,  in  my  opinion.  Yes  ;  you  may 
go.  If  your  head  is  not  turned  already,  you  may  go  and  get  it 
turned  to-morrow.  We  shall  see  whether  he  who  exalts  himself  is 
not  abased,  before  all  is  over  !  ”  And  he  was  striding  away,  when 
Plnlammon,  at  the  risk  of  an  explosion,  stopped  him. 

“  His  holiness  commanded  me  to  see  him,  sir,  before - ” 

Peter  turned  on  him  in  a  fury.  “  Fool  !  will  you  dare  to  intrude 
your  fantastical  dreams  on  him  at  such  a  moment  as  this  ?  ” 

‘  He  commanded  me  to  see  him,”  said  Philammon,  with  the  true 
soldier-like  discipline  of  a  monk  ;  “and  see  him  I  will,  in  spite  of 
any  man.  I  believe  in  my  heart  you  wish  to  keep  me  from  his  coun¬ 
sels  and  his  blessing.” 


113 


HYPATIA. 


Peter  looked  at  Mm  for  a  moment  'witk  a  right  wicked  expression, 
and  then,  to  the  youth's  astonishment,  struck  him  full  in  the  face, 
and  yelled  for  help. 

If  the  blow  had  been  given  by  Pamboin  the  Laura,  a  week  before, 
Philammon  would  have  bornp  it.  But  from  that  man,  and  coming 
unexpectedly,  as  the  finishing  stroke  to  all  his  disappointment  and 
disgust,  it  was  intolerable  ;  and  in  an  instant  Peter’s  long  legs  were 
sprawling  on  the  pavement,  while  he  bellowed  like  a  bull  for  all  the 
monks  of  Nitria. 

A  dozen  lean,  brown  hands  were  at  Philammon’s  throat  as  Peter 
rose. 

“  Seize  him  !  hold  him  !  ”  half  blubbered  he.  “  The  traitor  !  the 
heretic  !  He  holds  communion  with  heathens  !  ” 

“  Down  with  him  !  ”  “  Cast  him  out  !  ”  “  Carry  him  to  the  arch¬ 

bishop  !  ”  while  Philammon  shook  himself  free,  and  Peter  returned 
to  the  charge. 

I  call  all  erood  Catholics  to  witness  !  He  has  beaten  an  ecclesias- 
tic  in  the  courts  of  the  Lord’s  house,  even  in  the  midst  of  thee,  0 
Jerusalem  !  And  he  was  in  Hypatia’s  lecture-room  this  morning  !  ” 

A  groan  of  pious  horror  rose.  .  Philammon  set  his  back  against  the 
wall. 

“  His  holiness  the  patriarch  sent  me.” 

“  He  confesses,  he  confesses  !  He  deluded  the  piety  of  the  pa¬ 
triarch  into  letting  him  go,  under  cover  of  converting  her  ;  and  even 
now  he  wants  to  intrude  on  the  sacred  presence  of  Cyril,  burning  only 
with  carnal  desire  that  he  may  meet  the  sorceress  in  her  house  to¬ 
morrow  !  ” 

“  Scandal  !  ”  “Abomination  in  the  holy  place  !  ”  and  a  rush  at  the 
poor  youth  took  place. 

His  blood  was  thoroughly  up.  The  respectable  part  of  the  crowd, 
as  usual  in  such  cases,  prudently  retreated,  and  left  him  to  the  mercy 
of  the  monks,  with  an  eye  to  their  own  reputation  for  orthodoxy,  not 
to  mention  their  own  personal  safety  ;  and  he  had  to  help  himself  as 
he  could.  He  looked  round  for  a  weapon.  There  was  none.  The 
ring  of  monks  were  baying  at  him  like  hounds  round  a  bear  ;  and 
though  he  might  have  been  a  match  for  any  of  them  singly,  yet  their 
own  sinewy  limbs  and  determined  faces  warned  him  that  against  such 
odds  the  struggle  would  be  desperate. 

“  Let  me  leave  this  court  in  safety  !  God  knows  whether  I  am  a 
heretic  !  and  to  Him  I  commit  my  cause.  The  holy  patriarch  shall 
know  of  your  iniquity.  I  will  not  trouble  you  ;  I  give  you  leave  to 
call  me  heretic,  or  heathen,  if  you  will,  if  I  cross  this  threshold  till 
Cyril  himself  sends  for  me  back  to  shame  you,” 

And  he  turned  and  forced  his  way  to  the  gate,  amid  a  yell  of  de¬ 
rision,  which  brought  every  drop  of  blood  in  his  body  into  his  cheeks. 
Twice,  as  he  went  down  the  vaulted  passage,  a  rush  was  made  on  him 
from  behind,  but  the  soberer  of  his  persecutors  checked  it.  Yet  he 


TSE  SEAPPlMQ  OP  THE  BOW,  118 

could  not  leave  tliem,  young  and  hot -headed  as  he  was,  without  one 
last  word,  and  on  the  threshold  he  turned. 

“  You,  who  call  yourselves  the  disciples  of  the  Lord,  and  are  more 
like  the  demoniacs  who  abode  day  and  night  in  the  tombs,  crying  and 
cutting  themselves  with  stones - ” 

In  an  instant  they  rushed  upon  him  ;  and  luckily  for  him,  rushed 
also  into  the  arms  of  a  party  of  ecclesiastics,  who  were  hurrying  in 
from  the  street,  with  faces  of  blank  terror. 

“He  has  refused!”  shouted  the  foremost.  “He  declares  war 
against  the  Church  of  God  !  ” 

‘  ‘  O  my  friends  !  ”  panted  the  archdeacon,  “  we  are  escaped  like  the 
bird  out  of  the  snare  of  the  fowler.  The  tyrant  kept  us  waiting  two  hours 
at  his  palace  gates,  and  then  sent  lictors  out  upon  us,  with  rods  and 
axes,  telling  us  that  they  were  the  only  message  which  he  had  for 
robbers  and  rioters.” 

“Back  to  the  patriarch  1  ”  And  the  whole  mob  streamed  in  again, 
leaving  Philammon  alone  in  the  street - and  in  the  world. 

Whither  now  ? 

He  strode  on  in  his  wrath  some  hundred  yards  or  more,  before  he 
asked  himself  that  question.  And  when  he  asked  it,  he  found  him¬ 
self  in  no  humor  to  answer  it.  He  was  adrift,  and  blown  out  of  har¬ 
bor  upon  a  shoreless  sea,  in  utter  darkness  ;  all  heaven  and  earth 
were  nothing  to  him.  He  was  alone  in  the  blindness  of  anger. 

Gradually  one  fixed  idea,  as  a  light-tower,  began  to  glimmer  through 

the  storm . To  see  Hypatia  and  convert  her.  He  had  the  patriarch’s 

leave  for  that.  That  must  be  right.  That  would  justify  him, — 
bring  him  back,  perhaps,  in  a  triumph  more  glorious  than  any 
Caesar’s,  leading  captive,  in  the  fetters  of  the  Gospel,  the  Queen  of 
Heathendom.  Yes,  there  was  that  left,  for  which  to  live. 

His  passion  cooled  down  gradually  as  he  wandered  on  in  the  fading 
evening  light,  up  one  street  and  down  another,  till  he  had  utterly 
lost  his  way.  What  matter?  He  should  find  that  lecture-room  to¬ 
morrow,  at  least.  At  last  he  found  himself  in  a  broad  avenue  which 
he  seemed  to  know.  Was  that  the  Sun-gate  in  the  distance?  He 
sauntered  carelessly  down  it,  and  found  himself  at  last  on  the  great 
Esplanade,  whither  the  little  porter  had  taken  him  three  days  before. 
He  was  close  then  to  the  Museum,  and  to  her  house.  Destiny  had  led 
him,  unconsciously,  toward  the  scene  of  his  enterprise.  It  was  a 
good  omen  ;  he  would  go  thither  at  once.  He  might  sleep  upon  her 
door-step  as  well  as  upon  any  other.  Perhaps  he  might  catch  a 
glimpse  of  her  going  out  or  coming  in,  even  at  that  late  hour.  It  might 
be  well  to  accustom  himself  to  the  sight  of  her.  There  would  be  the 
less  chance  of  his  being  abashed  to-morrow  before  these  sorceress  eyes. 
And,  moreover,  to  tell  the  truth,  his  self-dependence  and  his  self-will 
too,  crushed,  or  rather  laid  to  sleep,  by  the  discipline  of  the  Laura, 
had  started  into  wild  life,  and  gave  him  a  mysterious  pleasure  which 
he  had  not  felt  since  he  was  a  disobedient  little  boy,  of  doing  what  he 


114 


BTPATIA. 


chose,  right  or  wrong,  simply  because  he  chose  it.  Such  moments 
come  to  every  free-willed  creature.  Happy  are  those  who  have  not, 
like  poor  Philammon,  been  kept  by  a  hot-bed  cultivation  from  know¬ 
ing  how  to  face  them.  But  he  had  yet  to  learn,  or  rather  his  tutors 
liad  to  learn,  that  the  sure  path  toward  willing  obedience  and  manful 
self-restraint  lies  not  through  slavery,  but  through  liberty. 

He  was  not  certain  which  was  Hypatia’s  house  ;  but  the  door  of  the 
Museum  he  could  not  forget.  So  there  he  sat  himself  down  under  the 
garden  wall,  soothed  by  the  cool  night,  and  the  holy  silence,  and  the  rich 
perfnme  of  the  thousand  foreign  flowers  which  filled  the  air  with  ener¬ 
vating  balm.  There  he  sat,  and  watched,  and  watched,  and  watched 
in  vain  for  some  glimpse  of  his  one  object.  Which  of  the  houses  was 
hers  ?  Which  was  the  window  of  her  chamber  ?  Did  it  look  into  the 
street?  What  business  had  his  fancy  with  women’s  chambers?. . . . 
But  that  one  open  window,  with  the  lamp  burning  brightly  inside — 
he  could  not  help  looking  up  to  it — he  could  not  help  fancying — 
hoping.  He  even  moved  a  few  yards,  to  see  better  the  bright  interior 
of  the  room.  High  up  as  it  was,  he  could  still  discern  shelves  of  books 
— pictures  on  the  walls.  Was  that  a  voice  ?  Yes  ! — a  woman’s 
voice — reading  aloud  in  meter — was  plainly  distinguishable  in  the 
dead  stillness  of  the  night,  which  did  not  even  awaken  a  whisper  in 
the  trees  above  his  head.  He  stood,  spell-bound  by  curiosity. 

Suddenly  the  voice  ceased,  and  a  woman’s  figure  came  forward  to  the 
window,  and  stood  motionless,  gazing  upward  at  the  spangled  star- 
world  overhead,  and  seeming  to  drink  in  the  glory,  and  the  silence, 
and  the  rich  perfume. . . .  .Could  it  be  she?  Every  pulse  in  his  body 

throbbed  madly . Could  it  be  ?  What  was  she  doing  !  He  could 

not  distinguish  the  features  ;  but  the  full  blaze  of  the  eastern  moon 
showed  him  an  upturned  brow,  between  a  golden  stream  of  glittering 
tresses  which  hid  her  whole  figure,  except  the  white  hands  clasped 

upon  her  bosom . Was  she  praying?  Were  these  her  midnight 

sorceries? _ 

And  still  his  heart  throbbed  and  throbbed,  till  he  almost  fancied  she 
must  hear  its  noisy  beat, — and  still  she  stood  motionless,  gazing  upon 
the  sky,  like  some  exquisite  chryselephantine  statue,  all  ivory  and 
gold.  And  behind  her,  round  the  bright  room  within,  painting,  books, 
a  whole  world  of  unknown  science  and  beauty.  .  .  .and  she  the  priest¬ 
ess  of  it  all.  . .  .inviting  him  to  learn  of  her  and  be  wise  !  It  was  a 
temptation  !  He  w^ould  flee  from  it ! — Fool  that  he  was  !  and  it 
might  not  be  she,  after  all  ! 

He  made  some  sudden  movement.  She  looked  down,  saw  him, 
and,  shutting  the  blind,  vanished  for  the  night.  In  vain,  now  that 
the  temptation  had  departed,  he  sat  and  waited  for  its  reappearance, 
half  cursing  himself  for  having  broken  the  spell.  But  the  chamber 
was  dark  and  silent  henceforth  ;  and  Philammon,  wearied  out,  found 
himself  soon  wandering  back  to  the  Laura  in  quiet  dreams,  beneath 
the  balmy  semi-tropic  night. 


CHAPTER  X 


THE  INTERVIEW. 

Philammon  was  aroused  from  liis  slumbers  at  sunrise  the  next 
morning  by  tlie  attendants  wlio  came  in  to  sweep  out  tlie  lecture- 
rooms,  and  wandered,  disconsolately  enougli,  up  and  down  the  street ; 
longing  for  and  yet  dreading  the  three  weary  hours  to  be  over  which 
must  pass  before  he  would  he  admitted  to  Hypatia.  But  he  had 
tasted  no  food  since  noon  the  day  before  ;  he  had  had  but  three 
hours’  sleep  the  previous  night,  and  had  been  working,  running,  and 
fighting  for  two  whole  days  without  a  moment’s  peace  of  body  or 
mind.  Sick  with  hunger  and  fatigue,  and  aching  from  head  to  foot 
with  his  hard  night’s  rest  on  the  granite  flags,  he  felt  as  unable  as 
man  could  well  do  to  collect  his  thoughts  or  brace  his  nerves  for  the 
coming  interview.  How  to  get  food  he  could  not  guess  ;  but  having 
two  hands,  he  might  at  least  earn  a  coin  by  carrying  a  load  ;  so  he 
went  down  to  the  Esplanade  in  search  of  work.  Of  that,  alas,  there 
Was  none.  So  he  sat  down  upon  the  parapet  of  the  quay,  and 
^vatched  the  shoals  of  sardines  which  played  in  and  out  over  the 
toarble  steps  below,  and  wondered  at  the  strange  crabs  and  sea- 
locusts  which  crawled  up  and  down  the  face  of  the  masonry,  a  few 
feet  below  the  surface,  scrambling  for  bits  of  offal,  and  making  occa¬ 
sional  fruitless  dashes  at  the  nimble  little  silver  arrows  which  played 
round  them.  And  at  last  his  whole  soul,  too  tired  to  think  of  anything 
else,  became  absorbed  in  a  mighty  struggle  between  two  great  crabs, 
ivho  held  on  stoutly,  each  by  a  claw,  to  his  respective  bunch  of  sea¬ 
weed,  -while  with  the  others  they  tugged,  one  at  the  head  and  the 
other  at  the  tail  of  a  dead  fish.  Which  would  conquer ?...  .Ay, 
which  ?  And  for  five  minutes  Philammon  was  alone  in  the  world 

with  the  two  struggling  heroes . Might  not  they  be  emblematic? 

Might  not  the  upper  one  typify  Cyril  ? — the  lower  one  Hypatia  ? — and 
the  dead  fish  between,  himself  ?  .  .  .  .  But  at  last  the  dead-lock  was 
suddenly  ended, — the  fish  parted  in  the  middle,  and  the  typical  Hypa¬ 
tia  and  Cyril,  losing  hold  of  their  respective  sea-w^eeds  by  the  jerk, 
tumbled  down,  each  with  its  Imlf  fish,  and  vanished  head  over  heels 
into  the  blue  depths,  in  so  undignified  a  manner  that  Philammon 
burst  into  a  shout  of  laughter. 

“What’s  the  joke?  ”  asked  a  well-known  voice  behind  him  ;  and  a 
hand  patted  him  familiarly  on  the  back.  He  looked  round,  and  saw 
the  little  porter,  his  head  crowned  with  a  fiih  basket  of  figs,  grapes., 

( 115  ) 


116 


HYPATIA. 


and  water*melons,  on  wliicli  the  poor  youth  cast  a  longing  eye. 
“  Well,  my  young  friend,  and  why  are  you  not  at  church  ?  Look  at 
all  the  saints  pouring  into  tlie  Caesareum  there,  behind  you.” 

Philammon  answered  sulkily  enough  something  inarticulate. 

“Ho,  ho  !  Quarreled  with  the  successor  of  the  Apostles  already? 
Has  my  prophecy  come  true,  and  the  strong  meat  of  pious  riot  and 
plunder  proved  too  highly  spiced  for  your  young  palate.  Eh  ?  ” 

Poor  Philammon  !  Angry  with  himself  for  feeling  that  the  porter 
was  right  ;  shrinking  from  the  notion  of  exposing  the  failings  of  his 
fellow-Christians  ;  shrinking  still  more  from  making  such  a  jacka¬ 
napes  his  confidant  ;  and  yet  yearning  in  his  loneliness  to  open  his 
heart  to  some  one,  he  dropped  out  hint  by  hint,  word  by  word,  the 
events  of  the  past  evening  ;  and  finished  by  a  request  to  be  put  in  the 
way  of  earning  his  breakfast, 

“Earning  your  breakfast?  Shall  the  favorite  of  the  gods— shall 
the  guest  of  Hypatia  earn  his  breakfast,  while  I  have  an  obol  to  share 
with  him?  Base  thought !  Youth!  I  have  wronged  you.  TJnphilo- 
sophically  I  allowed,  yesterday  morning,  envy  to  ruffle  the  ocean  of 
my  intellect.  We  are  now  friends  and  brothers,  in  hatred  to  the 
monastic  tribe.” 

“  1  do  not  hate  them,  I  tell  you,”  said  Philammon.  “  But  these 
Nitrian  savages - ” 

“  Are  the  perfect  examples  of  monkery,  and  you  hate  them  ;  and 
therefore,  all  greaters  containing  the  less,  you  hate  all  less  monastic 
monks, — I  have  not  heard  logic  lectures  in  vain.  Now,  up  !  The 
sea  WOOS  our  dusty  limbs  ;  Nereids  and  Tritons,  charging  no  cruel 
coin,  call  us  to  Nature’s  baths.  At  home  a  mighty  sheat-fish  smokes 
upon  the  festive  board  ;  beer  crowns  the  horn,  and  onions  deck  the 
dish  :  come  then,  my  guest  and  brother  I  ” 

Philammon  swallowed  certain  scruples  about  becoming  the  guest 
of  a  heathen,  seeing  that  otherwise  there  seemed  no  chance  of  having 
anything  else  to  swallow  ;  and,  after  a  refreshing  plunge  in  the  sea, 
followed  the  hospitable  little  fellow  to  Hypatia’s  door,  where  he 
dropped  his  daily  load  of-  fruit,  and  then  into  a  narrow  by-street,  to 
the  ground-floor  of  a  huge  block  of  lodgings,  with  a  common  stair¬ 
case,  swarming  with  children,  cats,  and  chickens  ;  and  was  ushered 
by  his  host  into  a  little  room,  where  the  savory  smell  of  broiling  fish 
revived  Philammon’s  heart. 

“Judith  1  Judith  !  wdiere  lingerest  thou?  Marble  of  Pentelicus  ! 
Foam-fiake  of  the  wine-dark  main  !  Lily  of  the  Mareotic  lake  !  You 
accursed  black  Andromeda,  if  you  don’t  bring  the  breakfast  this 
moment.  I’ll  cut  you  in  two  !” 

The  inner  door  opened,  and  in  bustled,  trembling,  her  hands  full 
of  dishes,  a  tall,  lithe  negress,  dressed  in  true  negro  fashion,  in  a 
snow-white  cotton  shift,  a  scarlet  cotton  petticoat,  and  a  bright  yel¬ 
low  turban  of  the  same,  making  a  light  in  that  dark  place  which 
would  have  served  as  a  landmark  a  mile  off.  She  put  the  dishes  down 


THE  mTERVlEW. 


117 


and  the  porter  majestically  waved  Pliilammon  to  a  stool,  while  she 
retreated,  and  stood  humbly  waiting  on  her  lord  and  master,  who  did 
not  deign  to  introduce  to  his  guest  the  black  beauty  which  composed 

his  whole  seraglio . But,  indeed,  such  an  act  of  courtesy  would 

have  been  needless,  for  the  first  morsel  of  fish  was  hardly  safe  in 
poor  Pliilammon’s  mouth,  when  the  negress  rushed  upon  him,  caught 
him  by  the  head,  and  covered  bim  with  rapturous  kisses. 

Up  jumped  the  little  man  with  a  yell,  brandishing  a  knife  in  one 
hand  and  a  leeJt  in  the  other,  while  Pliilammon,  scarcely  less  scan¬ 
dalized,  jumped  up  too,  and  shook  himself  free  of  the  lady,  who, 
finding  it  impossible  to  vent  her  feelings  further  on  his  head, 
instantly  changed  her  tactics,  and,  wallowing  on  the  floor,  began 
f ran  tidy  kissing  his  feet, 

“What  is  this!  Before  my  face  1  Up,  shameless  baggage,  or 
thou  diest  the  death  I  ”  and  the  porter  pulled  her  up  upon  her 
knees. 

“It  is  the  monk  I  the  young  man  I  told  you  of,  who  saved  me 
from  the  Jews  the  other  night!  What  good  angel  sent  him  here  that 
I  might  IhMik  him  ?  ”  cried  the  poor  creature,  while  the  tears  ran 
down  lief  llhick,  shining  face, 

“  I  am  that  good  angel,”  said  the  porter,  with  a  look  of  intense 
self-satisfaction.  “Rise,  daughter  of  Erebus  ;  thou  art  pardoned, 
being  but  a  female.  What  says  the  poet  ? 

‘  Woman  is  passion’s  slave,  while  riehtful  lord 
O’er  her  and  passion,  rules  the  noble  male.’ 

Youth!  to  my  arms!  Truly  say  the  philosophers,  that  the  universe 
is  magical  in  itself,  and  by  mysterious  sympathies  links  like  to  like. 
The  prophetic  instinct  of  thy  future  benefits  toward  me  drew  me  to 
thee  as  by  an  invisible  warp,  hawser,  or  chain-cable,  from  the 
moment  I  beheld  thee.  Thou  wert  a  kindred  spirit,  my  brother, 
though  thou  knewest  it  not.  Therefore  I  do  not  praise  thee, — no, 
nor  thank  thee  in  the  least,  though  thou  hast  preserved  for  me  the 
one  palm  which  shadows  my  weary  steps, — the  single  lotus-flower 
(in  tliis  case  black,  not  white)  which  blooms  for  me  above  the  mud- 
stained  ocean-wastes  of  the  Hylic  Borboros.  That  which  thou  hast 
done,  thou  hast  done  by  instinct, — by  divine  compulsion, — thou 
couhist  no  more  help  it  than  thou  canst  help  eating  that  fish  ;  and 
art  no  more  to  be  praised  for  it,” 

“  Thank  you,”  said  Pliilammon. 

“  Comprehend  me.  Our  theory  in  the  schools  for  such  cases  is 
this, — has  been  so  at  least  for  the  last  six  months, — similar  particles, 
from  one  original  source,  exist  in  you  and  me.  Similar  causes  pro¬ 
duce  similar  effects  ;  our  attractions,  antipathies,  impulses,  are 
therefore,  in  similar  circumstances,  absolutely  the  same  ;  and  there¬ 
fore  you  did  the  other  night — exactly  what  I  should  have  done  in 
your  case,” 


118 


MY P  ATI  A. 


Pliilammon  tliouglit  the  latter  part  of  the  theory  open  to  question, 
but  he  had  by  no  means  stopped  eating  when  he  rose,  and  his  moutn 
was  much  too  full  of  fish  to  argue. 

“And  therefore,”  continued  the  little  man,  “  we  are  to  consider 
ourselves  henceforth  as  one  soul  in  two  bodies.  You  may  have  the 
best  of  the  corporeal  part  of  the  division.  .  .  .yet  it  is  the  soul  which 
makes  the  person.  You  may  trust  me,  I  shall  not  disdain  my 
brotherhood.  If  any  one  insults  you  henceforth,  you  have  but  to 
call  for  me  ;  and,  if  I  be  within  hearing,  why,  by  this  right  arm - ” 

And  he  attempted  a  pat  on  Philammoii’s  head,  which,  as  there  was 
ahead  and  shoulders  difference  between  them,  might  on  the  whole 
have  been  considered,  from  a  theatric  point  of  view,  as  a  failure. 
Whereon  the  little  man  seized  the  calabash  of  beer,  and  filling  there¬ 
with  a  cow’s  horn,  his  thumb  on  the  small  end,  raised  it  high  in  air. 

“  To  the  Tenth  Muse,  and  to  your  interview  with  her  !  ” 

And  removing  his  thumb,  he  sent  a  steady  jet  into  his  open  mouth, 
and,  having  drained  the  horn  without  drawing  breath,  licked  his  lips, 
handed  it  to  Philammon,  and  flew  ravenously  upon  the  fisli  and 
onions. 

Philammon,  to  whom  the  whole  was  supremely  absurd,  had  no 
invocation  to  make,  but  one  which  he  felt  too  sacred  for  his  present 
temper  of  mind,  so  he  attempted  to  imitate  the  little  man’s  feat,  and, 
of  course,  poured  the  beer  into  his  eyes,  and  up  his  nose,  and  in  his 
bosom,  and  finally  choked  himself  black  in  the  face,  while  his  host 
observed,  smilingly, — 

“Aha?  rustic?  unacquainted  with  the  ancient  and  classical 
customs  preserved  in  this  center  of  civilization  by  the  descendants  of 
Alexander’s  heroes?  Judith  !  clear  the  table.  Now  to  the  sanctuary 
of  the  Muses  !  ” 

Philammon  rose,  and  finished  his  meal  by  .  a  monkish  grace.  A 
gentle  and  reverent  “  Amen  ”  rose  from  the  other  end  of  the  room. 
It  was  the  negress.  She  saw  him  look  up  at  her,  dropped  her  eyes 
modestly,  and  bustled  away  with,  the  remnants,  while  Philammon 
and  his  host  started  for  Hypatia’s  lecture-room. 

“  Your  wife  is  a  Christian  ?”  asked  he,  when  they  were  outside  the 
door. 

“Ahem - !  The  barbaric  mind  is  prone  to  superstition.  Yet  she 

is,  being  but  a  woman  and  a  negress,  a  good  soul,  and  thrifty,  though 
requiring,  like  all  lower  animals,  occasional  chastisement.  I  married 
her  on  philosophic. grounds.  A  wife  was  necessary  to  me,  for  several 
reasons  :  but  mindful  that  the  philosopher  should  subjugate  the 
material  appetite,  and  rise  above  the  swinish  desires  of  the  flesh, 
even  when  his  nature  requires  him  to  satisfy  them,  I  purposed  to 
make  pleasure  as  unpleasant  as  possible.  I  had  the  choice  of  several 
cripples, — their  parents,  of  ancient  Macedonian  fan:  ily,  lilte  myself, 
were  by  no  means  adverse  ;  but  1  required  a  houselceeper,  with  whose 
duties  the  want  of  an  arm  or  a  leg  migiit  have  interfered.” 


TUE  INTERVIEW. 


110 


“  Wliy  did  you  not  marry  a  scold  ?  ”  asked  Philammon. 

“  Pertinently  observed.  And,  indeed,  tlie  example  of  Socrates  rose 
luminous  more  than  once  before  my  imagination.  But  philosophic 
calm,  my  dear,  youth,  and  the  peaceful  contemplation  of  the  ineffable  ? 
I  could  not  relinquish  these  luxuries.  So  having,  by  the  bounty  of 
Hypatia  and  her  pupils,  saved  a  small  sum,  I  went  out,  bought  me  a 
negress,  and  hired  six  rooms  in  the  block  we  have  just  left,  where  T 
let  lodgings  to  young  students  of  the  Divine  Philosophy.’’ 

‘‘  Have  you  any  lodgers  now  ?” 

“  Ahem  !  Certain  rooms  are  occupied  by  a  lady  of  rank.  The 
philosopher  will,  above  all  things,  abstain  from  babbling.  To  bridle 

the  tongue,  is  to - .  But  there  is  a  closet  at  your  service  ;  and  for 

the  hall  of  reception,  which  you  have  just  left, — are  you  not  a  kin¬ 
dred  and  fraternal  spark?  We  can  combine  our  meals,  as  our  souls 
are  already  united.” 

Philammon  thanked  him  heartily  for  the  offer,  though  he  shrunk 
from  accepting  it  ;  and  in  ten  minutes  more  found  himself  at  the 
door  of  the  very  house  which  he  had  been  watching  the  night  before. 
It  was  she,  then,  whom  he  had  seen  !  .  .  .  .  He  was  handed  over  by  a 
black  porter  to  a  smart  slave-girl,  who  guided  him  up  through 
cloisters  and  corridors  to  tlie  large  library,  where  five  or  six  young 
men  were  sitting,  busily  engaged,  under  Theon’s  superintendence, 
in  copying  manuscripts  and  drawing  geometric  diagrams. 

Philammon  gazed  curiously  at  these  symbols  of  a  science  unknown 
to  him,  and  wondered  whether  the  day  would  ever  come  when  he  too 
would  understand  their  mysteries  ;  but  his  eyes  fell  again  as  he  saw 
the  youths  staring  at  his  ragged  sheep-skin  and  matted  locks  with  un¬ 
disguised  contempt.  He  could  hardly  collect  himself  enough  to  obey 
the  summons  of  the  venerable  old  man,  as  he  beckoned  him  silently 
out  of  the  room,  and  led  him,  with  the  titters  of  the  young  students 
ringing  in  his  ears,  through  the  door  by  which  he  had  entered,  and 

along  a  gallery,  till  he  stopped  and  knocked  humbly  at  a  door . 

She  must  be  within  !  . . . .  Now  !  ....  At  last  ! .  . . .  His  knees  knocked 
together  under  him.  His  heart  sunk  and  sunk  into  abysses.  Poor 
wretch  !  . . .  .  He  was  half-minded  once  to  escape  and  dash  into  the 
street  ....  but  was  it  not  his  one  hope,  his  one  object?  ....  But  why 
did  not  that  old  man  speak?  If  he  would  but  have  said  something. 

.  . .  .If  he  would  have  only  looked  cross,  contemptuous . But 

with  the  same  impressive  gravity  as  of  a  man  upon  a  business  in 
which  he  had  no  voice,  and  wished  it  to  be  understood  that  he  had 
none,  the  old  man  silently  opened  the  door,  and  Philammon  fol¬ 
lowed.  ...  There  she  was  !  Looking  more  glorious  than  ever ; 
more  than  when  glowing  with  the  enthusiasm  of  her  own  eloquence  ; 
more  than  when  transfigured  last  night  in  golden  tresses  and  glitter¬ 
ing  moonbeams.  There  she  sat,  without  moving  a  finger,  as  the  two 
entered.  She  greeted  her  father  with  a  smile,  which  made  up  for 
all  her  seeming  want  of  courtesy  to  him,  and  then  fixed  her  large 
gray  eyes  full  on  ^Philammon. 


120 


BYPATIA. 


“  Here  is  tlie  youth,  my  daughter.  It  was  your  wish,  you  know  ; 

and  I  always  believe  that  you  know  best - ” 

Another  smile  put  an  end  to  the  speech,  and  the  old  man  retreated 
humbly  toward  another  door,  with  a  somewhat  anxious  visage,  and 
then,  lingering  and  looking  back,  his  hand  upon  the  latch, — 

“If  you  require  any  one,  you  know,  you  have  only  to  call, — we 
shall  be  all  in  the  library.” 

Another  smile  ;  and  the  old  man  disappeared,  leaving  the  two  alone, 
Philammon  stood  trembling,  choking,  his  eyes  fixed  on  the  fioor. 
Where  were  all  the  fine  things  he  had  conned  over  for  the  occasion? 
He  dared  not  look  up  at  that  face,  lest  it  should  drive  them  out  of 
his  head.  And  yet  the  more  he  kept  his  eyes  turned  from  the  face, 
the  more  he  was  conscious  of  it,  conscious  that  it  was  watching  him  ; 
and  the  more  all  the  fine  words  were,  by  that  very  knowledge,  driven 

out  of  his  head . When  would  she  speak?  Perhaps  she  wished 

him  to  speak  first.  It  was  her  duty  to  begin  ;  for  she  had  sent  for 

him . But  still  she  kept  silence,  and  sat  scanning  him  intently 

from  head  to  foot,  herself  as  motionless  as  a  statue  ;  her  hands 
folded  together  before  her,  over  the  manuscript  which  lay  upon  her 
knee.  If  there  was  a  blush  on  her  cheek  at  her  own  daring,  his 
eyes  swam  too  much  to  notice  it. 

When  would  the  intolerable  suspense  end  ?  She  was,  perhaps,  as 
unwilling  to  speak  as  he.  But  some  one  must  strike  the  first  blow  ; 
and,  as  often  happens,  the  weaker  party,  impelled  by  sheer  fear, 
struck  it,  and  broke  the  silence  in  a  tone  half  indignant,  half  apolo, 
getic : — 

“You  sent  for  me  hither  !” 

“I  did.  It  seemed  tome,  as  I  watched  you  during  my  lecture, 
both  before  and  after  you  were  rude  enough  to  interrupt  me,  that 
your  offense  was  one  of  mere  youthful  ignorance.  It  seemed  to  me 
that  your  countenance  bespoke  a  nobler  nature  than  that  which  the 
gods  are  usually  pleased  to  bestow  upon  monks.  That  I  may  now 
ascertain  whether  or  not  my  surmises  were  correct,  I  ask  you  for 
what  purpose  are  you  come  hither?  ’ 

Pbilammon  hailed  the  question  as  a  godsend.  Now  for  his  mes¬ 
sage  !  And  yet  he  faltered,  as  he  answered  with  a  desperate  effort, — 
“  To  rebuke  you  for  your  sins.” 

“My  sins?  What  sins?”  she  asked,  as  she  looked  up  with  a 
stately,  slow  surprise  in  those  large  gray  eyes,  before  which  his  own 
glance  sunk  abashed,  he  knew  not  why.  What  sins? — He  knew  not. 
Did  she  look  like  a  Messalina?  But  was  she  not  a  heathen  and  a 
sorceress?' — And  yet  he  blushed,  and  stammered,  and  hung  down  his 
head,  as,  shrinking  at  the  sound  of  his  own  words,  he  replied, — 

“  The  foul  sorceries — and  profligacy  worse  than  sorceries,  in  which 
they  say  ” — He  could  get  no  farther  .  for  he  looked  up  again  and  saw 
an  awful  quiet  smile  upon  that  face.  His  words  had  raised  no  blush 
upon  the  marble  cheek. 


THE  INTERVIEW. 


121 


“  Tliey  say }  Tlie  bigots  and  slanderers  ;  wild  beasts  of  the  desert, 
and  fanatic  intriguers,  wlio,  in  tlie  words  of  Him  tliey  call  tbeir  mas¬ 
ter,  compass  heaven  and  earth  to  make  one  proselyte,  and  when  they 
have  found  him,  make  him  twofold  more  the  child  of  hell  than  them¬ 
selves.  Go, — 1  forgive  you, — you  are  young  and  know  not  yet  the 
mystery  of  the  world.  Science  will  teach  you  some  day  that  the  out¬ 
ward  frame  is  the  sacrament  of  the  soul’s  inward  beauty.  Such  a 
soul  I  had  fancied  your  face  expressed  ;  but  I  was  mistaken.  Foul 
hearts  alone  harbor  such  foul  suspicions,  and  fancy  others  to  be 
what  they  know  they  might  become  themselves.  Go  !  Do  I  look 
like — ?  The  very  tapering  of  these  fingers,  if  thou  couldst  read 
their  symbolism,  would  give  your  dream  the  lie.”  And  she  fiashed 
full  on  him,  like  sun-rays  from  a  mirror,  the  full  radiance  of  her 
glorious  countenance, 

Alas,  poor  Philammon  !  Where  thy  eloquent  arguments,  thy  ortho- 
dox  the»ries  then  ?  Proudly  he  struggled  with  his  own  man’s  heart 
of  flesh,  and  tried  to  turn  his  eyes  away  :  the  magnet  might  as  well 
struggle  to  escape  from  the  spell  of  the  north.  In  a  moment,  he 
knew  not  how,  utter  shame,  remorse,  longing  for  forgiveness,  swept 
over  him,  and  crushed  him  down  ;  and  he  found  himself  on  his  knees 
before  her,  in  abject  and  broken  syllables  entreating  pardon. 

“  Go, — I  forgive  you.  But  know  before  you  go,  that  the  celestial 
milk  which  fell  from  Here’s  bosom,  bleaching  the  plant  which  it 
touched  to  everlasting  whiteness,  was  not  more  taintless  that  the  soul 
of  Theon’s  daughter.” 

He  looked  up  in  her  face  as  he  knelt  before  her.  Unerring  instinct 
told  him  that  her  words  were  true.  He  was  a  monk, — accustomed  to 
believe  animal  sin  to  be  the  deadliest  and  worst  of  all  sins, — indeed, 
“  the  great  offense  ”  itself,  beside  which  all  others  were  comparatively 
venial  ;  where  there  was  physical  purity  must  not  all  other  virtues 
follow  in  its  wake  ?  All  other  failings  were  invisible  under  the  daz¬ 
zling  veil  of  that  great  loveliness, — and  in  his  self-abasement  he  went 
on,~ 

“  O  do  not  spurn  me  !  Do  not  drive  me  away  !  I  have  neither 
friend,  home,  nor  teacher.  I  fled  last  night  from  the  men  of  my  own 
faith,  maddened  by  bitter  insult  and  injustice, — disappointed  and 
disgusted  with  their  ferocity,  narrowness,  ignorance.  I  dare  not,  I 
cannot,  I  will  not,  return  to  the  obscurity  and  the  dullness  of  a  The- 
baid  Laura.  I  have  a  thousand  doubts  to  solve,  a  thousand  questions 
to  ask,  about  that  great  ancient  world  of  which  I  know  nothing, — of 
whose  mysteries,  they  say,  you  alone  possess  the  key  !  I  am  a 

Christian  ;  but  I  thirst  for  knowledge . I  do  not  promise  to  believe 

you, — I  do  not  promise  to  obey  you  ;  but  let  me  hear  !  Teach  me 
what  you  know,  that  I  may  compare  it  with  what  I  know . If  in¬ 

deed”  (and  he  shuddered  as  he  spoke  the  words)  “  I  do  know  any¬ 
thing  !  ” 

“  Have  you  forgotten  the  epithets  which  you  used  to  me  just  now  V’ 


123 


HYPATIA. 


No,  no  !  But  do  you  forget  them  ;  they  were  put  into  my  mouth 
I — I  did  not  believe  them  when  I  said  them.  It  was  agony  to  me  ; 
but  I  did  it,  as  1  thought,  for  your  sake, — to  save  you.  0  say  that  I 
may  come  and  hear  you  again  !  Only  from  a  distance, — in  th«  very 
farthest  corner  of  your  lecture-room.  I  will  be  silent  ;  you  shall 
never  see  me.  But  your  words  yesterday  awoke  in  me — no,  not 
doubts  ;  but  still  I  must,  I  muSt  hear  more,  or  be  as  miserable  and 
homeless  inwardly  as  I  am  in  my  outward  circumstances  !  ”  And  he 
looked  up  imploringly  for  consent. 

“  Rise.  This  passion  and  that  attitude  are  fitting  neither  for  you 
nor  me.’' 

And  as  Philammon  rose,  she  rose  also,  wont  into  the  library  to  her 
father,  and  in  a  few  minutes  returned  with  him. 

“Come  with  me,  young  man,”  said  he,  laying  his  hand  kindly 

enough  on  Philammon’s  shoulder . “The  rest  of  this  matter  you 

and  I  can  settle;”  and  Philammon  followed  him,  not  daring  to 
look  back  at  Hypatia,  while  the  whole  room  swam  before  his 
eyes. 

“  So,  so  ;  I  hear  you  have  been  saying  rude  things  to  my  daughter. 
Well,  she  has  forgiven  you - ” 

“  Has  she?”  asked  the  young  monk,  with  an  eager  start. 

“  Ah  !  you  may  well  look  astonished.  But  I  forgive  you,  too.  It 
is  lucky  for  you,  however,  that  I  did  not  hear  you,  or  else,  old  man 
as  I  am,  I  can’t  say  what  I  might  not  have  done.  Ah,  you  little 
know,  you  little  know  what  she  is  !  ” — tind  the  old  pedant’s  eyes  kin¬ 
dled  witl^  loving  pride.  “  May  the  gods  give  you  some  day  such  a 
daughter  ! — that  is,  if  you  learn  to  deserve  it, — as  virtuous  as  she  is 
wise,  as  wise  as  she  is  beautiful.  Truly,  they  have  repaid  me  for 
my  labors  in  their  service.  Look,  young  man  !  little  as  you  merit  it, 
here  is  a  pledge  of  your  forgiveness,  such  as  the  richest  and  noblest 
in  Alexandria  are  glad  to  purchase  with  many  an  ounce  of  gold, — a 
ticket  of  free  admission  to  all  her  lectures  henceforth  !  Now  go  ; 
you  have  been  favored  beyond  your  deserts,  and  should  learn  that  the 
philosopher  can  practice  what  the  Christian  only  preaches,  and  return 
good  for  evil.”  And  he  put  into  Philammon’s  hand  a  slip  of  paper, 
and  bid  one  of  the  secretaries  show  him  to  the  outer  door. 

The  youths  looked  up  at  him  from  their  writing  as  he  passed,  with 
faces  of  surprise  and  awe,  and  evidently  thinking  no  more  about  the 
absurdity  of  his  sheep-skin  and  his  tanned  complexion  ;  and  he  went 
out  with  a  stunned,  confused  feeling,  as  of  one  who,  by  a  desperate 
leap,  has  plunged  into  a  new  world.  He  tried  to  feel  content  ;  but 
he  dare  not.  All  before  him  was  anxiety,  uncertainty.  He  had  cut 
himself  adrift  ;  he  was  on  the  great  stream.  Whither  would  it  lead 
him?  Well — was  it  not  the  great  stream?  Had  not  all  mankind, 
for  all  the  ages,  been  floating  on  it  ?  Or  was  it  but  a  desert  river, ; 
dwindling  away  beneath  the  fiery  sun,  destined  to  lose  itself  a  few, 
miles  on,  among  the  arid  sands?  Were  Arsenins  and  the  faith  oji 


TUE  INTERVIEW, 


123 


his  childhood  right  ?  And  was  the  Old  World  coming  speedily  to  its 
death-throe,  and  the  kingdom  of  God  at  hand  ?  Or,  was  Cyril  right, 
and  the  Church  Catholic  appointed  to  spread  and  conquer,  and  de¬ 
stroy,  and  rebuild,  till  the  kingdoms  of  this  world  had  become  the 
kingdoms  of  God  and  of  his  Christ?  If  so — what  use  in  this  old 
knowledge  which  he  craved  ?  And  yet,  if  the  day  of  the  destruction 
of  all  things  w'ere  at  hand,  and  the  times  destined  to  become  worse 
and  not  better,  till  the  end, — how  could  that  be? . 

“What  news?”  asked  the  little  porter,  who  had  been  waiting 
for  him  at  the  door  all  the  while.  “  What  news,  O  favorite  of  the 
gods  ?  ” 

“I  will  lodge  with  you,  and  labor  with  you.  Ask  me  no  more  at 
present.  I  am — I  am - ” 

“  Those  who  descended  into  the  cave  of  Trophonius,  and  beheld 
the  unspeakable,  remained  astonished  for  three  days,  my  young 
friend, — and  so  will  you  !  ”  And  they  went  forth  together  to  earn 
their  bread. 

But  what  is  Hypatia  doing  all  this  while,  upon  that  cloudy  Olym¬ 
pus,  where  she  sits  enshrined  far  above  the  noise  and  struggle  of 
man  and  his  work-day  world  ? 

She  is  sitting  again,  with  her  manuscript  open  before  her  :  but  she 
is  thinking  of  the  young  monk,  not  of  them 

“  Beautiful  as  Antinoiis  !. . .  .Rather  as  the  young  Phoebus  himself, 
fresh  glowing  from  the  slaughter  of  the  Python.  Why  should  not 
he,  too,  become  a  slayer  of  Pythons,  and  loathsome  monsters,  bred 
from  the  mud  of  sense  and  matter  ?  So  bold  and  earnest  ! — I  can 
forgive  him  those  words  for  the  very  fact  of  his  having  dared,  here 

in  my  father’s  house,  to  say  them  to  me . And  yet  so  tender,  so 

open  to  repentance  and  noble  shame  ! — That  is  no  plebeian  by  birth  : 
patrician  blood  surely  flows  in  those  veins  ;  it  shows  out  in  every  at¬ 
titude,  every  tone,  every  motion  of  the  hand  and  lip.  He  cannot  be 
one  of  the  herd.  Who  ever  knew  one  of  them  crave  after  knowl¬ 
edge  for  its  own  sake?. . .  .And  I  have  longed  so  for  one  real  pupil  ! 
I  have  longed  so  to  find  one  such  man,  among  the,  effeminate,  selfish 
triflers  who  pretend  to  listen  to  me.  I  thought  I  had  found  one, — 
and  the  moment  that  I  had  lost  him,  behold  I  find  another  ;  and  that 
a  fresher,  purer,  simpler  nature  than  ever  Raphael’s  was  at  its  best. 
By  all  the  laws  of  physiognomy,  by  all  the  symbolism  of  gesture  and 
voice  and  complexion,  by  the  instinct  of  my  own  heart,  that  young 
monk  might  be  the  instrument,  the  ready,  valiant,  obedient  instru¬ 
ment,  for  carrying  out  all  my  dreams.  If  I  could  but  train  him  into 
a  Longinus,  I  could  dare  to  play  the  part  of  a  Zenobia,  with  him  as 
counselor . And  for  my  Odenatus — Orestes  ?  Horrible  !  ” 

She  covered  her  face  wdth  her  hand  a  minute.  “  No  !  ”  she  said, 
dashing  away  the  tears, —  “  That  —  and  anything  —  and  everything 
for  the  cause  of  Philosophy  and  the  gods  !  ” 


CHAPTER  XI. 


THE  LAURA  AGAIN. 

Not  a  sound,  nor  a  moving  object,  broke  tlie  utter  stillness  of  the 
glen  of  Scetis.  The  shadows  of  the  crags,  though  paling  every  mo¬ 
ment  before  the  spreading  dawn,  still  shrouded  all  the  gorge  in 
gloom.  A  winding  line  of  haze  slept  above  the  course  of  the  rivulet. 
The  plumes  of  the  palm-trees  hung  motionless,  as  if  awaiting  in 
resignation  the  breathless  blaze  of  the  approaching  day.  At  length, 
among  the  green  ridges  of  the  monastery  garden,  two  gray  figures 
rose  from  their  knees,  and  began,  with  slow  and  feeble  strokes,  to 
break  the  silence  by^the  clatter  of  their  hoes  among  the  pebbles. 

“  These  beans  grow  wonderfully,  brother  Aufugus.  We  shall  be 
«.ble  to  sow  our  second  crop,  by  God’s  blessing,  a  week  earlier  than 
We  did  last  year.” 

The  person  addresssd  returned  no  answer  ;  and  his  companion, 
after  watching  him  for  some  time  in  silence,  recommenced  : — 

“  What  is  it,  my  brother?  I  have  remarked,  lately,  a  melancholy 
about  you,  which  is  hardly  fitting  for  a  man  of  God.” 

A  deep  sigh  was  the  only  answer.  The  speaker  laid  down  his  hoe, 
and,  placing  his  hand  affectionately  on  the  shoulder  of  Aufugus, 
asked  again  : — 

“What  is  it  my  friend?  I  will  not  claim  with  you  my  abbot’s 
right,  to  know  the  secrets  of  your  heart :  but  surely  that  breast  hides 
nothing  which  is  unworthy  to  be  spoken  to  me,  however  unworthy  I 
may  be  to  hear  it.” 

“  Why  should  I  not  be  sad,  Pambo,  my  friend  ?  Does  not  Solomon 
Say  there  is  a  time  for  mourning  ?  ” 

“  True  :  but  a  time  for  mirth  also.” 

“  None  to  the  penitent,  burdened  with  the  guilt  of  many  sins.” 

“  Recollect  what  the  blessed  Anthony  used  to  say, — ‘  Trust  not  in 
thine  own  righteousness,  and  regret  not  that  which  is  past.’” 

“  I  do  neither,  Pambo.” 

“  Do  not  be  too  sure  of  that.  Is  it  not  because  thou  art  still  trust¬ 
ing  in  thyself,  that  thou  dost  regret  the  past,  which  shows  thee  that 
thou  art  not  that  which  thou  wouldst  gladly  pride  thyself  on  being  ?” 

“Pambo,  my  friend,”  said  Arsenins,  solemnly,  “I  will  tell  thee 
all.  My  sins  are  not  yet  past  ;  for  Honorius,  my  pupil,  still  lives,  and 
in  him  lives  the  weakness  and  the  misery  of  Rome.  My  sins  past  ? 
If  they  are  why  do  I  see  rising  before  me,  night  after  night,  that 

X  124 ) 


THE  LAURA  AGAIN. 


125 


train  of  accusing  specters,  ghosts  of  men  slain  in  battle,  widows  and 
orphans,  virgins  of  the  Lord  shrieking  in  the  grasp  of  barbarians, 
who  stand  by  my  bedside,  and  cry,  ‘  Hadst  thou  done  thy  duty,  we 
had  not  been  thus  !  Where  is  that  imperial  charge  which  God  com¬ 
mitted  to  thee  V  .  And  the  old  man  hid  his  face  in  his  hands,  and 
wept  bitterly. 

Pambo  laid  his  hand  again  tenderly  on  the  weeper’s  shoulder. 

“  Is  there  np  pride  here,  my  brother  ?  Who  art  thou,  to  change 
the  fate  of  nations  and  the  hearts  of  emperors,  which  are  in  the  hand 
of  the  King  of  kings.  If  thou  wert  weak,  and  imperfect  in  thy  work, 
— for  unfaithful,  I  will  warrant  thee,  thou  wert  never, — He  put  thee 
there,  because  thou  wert  imperfect,  that  so  that  which  has  come  to 
pass  might  come  to  pass  ;  and  thou  bearest  thine  own  burden  only, — 
and  yet  not  thou  ;  but  He  who  bore  it  for  thee.” 

“  Why  then  am  I  tormented  by  these  nightly  visions  ?  ” 

“  Fear  them  not,  friend.  They  are  spirits  of  evil,  and  therefore 
lying  spirits.  Were  they  good  spirits,  they  would  speak  to  thee  only 
in  pity,  forgiveness,  encouragement.  But  be  they  ghosts  or  demons, 
they  must  be  evil,  because  they  ale  accusers,  like  the  Evil  One  him¬ 
self,  the  accuser  of  the  saints.  He  is  the  father  of  lies,  and  his  chil¬ 
dren  will  be  like  himself.  What  said  the  blessed  Anthony  ?  That  a 
monk  should  not  busy  his  brain  with  painting  specters,  or  give  him¬ 
self  up  for  lost ;  but  rather  be  cheerful,  as  one  who  knows  that  he  is 
redeemed,  and  in  the  hands  of  the  Lord,  where  the  Evil  One  has  no 
power  to  hurt  him.  ‘For,’  housed  to  say,  ‘  the  demons  behave  to 
us  even  as  they  find  us.  If  they  see  us  cast  down  and  faithless,  they 
terrify  us  still  more,  that  they  may  plunge  us  in  despair.  But  if  they 
see  us  full  of  faith,  and  joyful  in  the  Lord,  with  our  souls  filled  with 
the  glory  which- shall  be,  then  they  shrink  abashed,  and  flee  away  in 
confusion.’  Cheer  up,  friend  !  such  thoughts  are  of  the  night,  the 
hour  of  Satan  and  of  the  powers  of  darkness  ;  and  with  the  dawn 
they  flee  away.” 

“And  yet  things  are  revealed  to  men  upon  their  beds,  in  visions  of 
the  night.” 

“  Be  it  so.  Nothing,  at  all  events,  has  been  revealed  to  thee  upon 
thy  bed,  except  that  which  thou  knowest  already  far  better  than  Satan 
does,  namely,  that  thou  art  a  sinner.  But  for  me,  my  friend,  though 
I  doubt  not  that  such  things  are,  it  is  the  day,  and  not  the  night, 
which  brings  revelations.” 

“  How,  then?” 

“Because  by  day  I  can  see  to  read  that  book  which  is  written,  like 
the  Law  given  on  Sinai,  upon  tables  of  stone,  by  the  finger  of  God 
himself.” 

Arsenius  looked  up  at  him  inquiringly.  Pambo  smiled. 

“  Thou  knowest  that,  like  many  holy  men  of  old,  I  am  no  scholar, 
ind  knew  not  even  the  Greek  tongue,  till  thou,  out  of  thy  brotherly 
cindness,  taughtest  it  to  me*  But  hast  thou  never  heard  what  Anthony 


126 


ETPATIA. 


said  to  a  certain  pagan  wlio  reproact'jd  Mm  witli  his  ignorance  of 
books?  '  Which  is  first/  he  asked,  ‘  spirit,  or  letter? — Spirit,  sayest 
thou  ?  Then  know,  the  healthy  spirit  needs  no  letters.  My  book  is 
the  whole  creation  lying  open  before  me,  wherein  I  can  read,  whenso¬ 
ever  I  please,  the  word  of  God.’” 

“Dost  thou  not  undervalue  learning,  iny  friend?  ” 

“  I  am  old  among  monks,  and  have  seen  much  of  their  ways  ;  and 
among  them  my  simplicity  seems  to  have  seen  this, — many  a  man 
wearying  himself  with  study,  and  tormenting  his  soul  as  to  whether 
he  believed  rightly  this  doctrine  and  that,  while  he  knew  not  with 
Solomon  that  in  much  learning  is  much  sorrow,  and  that  while  he 
was  puzzling  at  the  letter  of  God’s  message,  the  spirit  of  it  was  going 
fast  and  faster  out  of  him.” 

“  And  how  didst  thou  know  that  of  such  a  man  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  By  seeing  him  become  a  more  and  more  learned  theologian,  and 
more  and  more  zealous  for  the  letter  of  orthodoxy  ;  and  yet  less  and 
less  loving  and  merciful, — less  and  less  full  of  trust  in  God,  and  of 
hopeful  thoughts  for  himself  and  for  his  brethren,  till  he  seemed  to 
have  darkened  his  whole  soul  with  disputations,  which  breed  only 
strife,  and  to  have  forgotten  utterly  the  message  which  is  written  in 
that  book  wherewith  the  blessed  Anthony  w'as  content.  ” 

‘  ‘  Of  what  message  dost  thou  speak  !  ” 

“  Look,”  said  the  old  abbot,  stretching  his  hand  toward  the  East¬ 
ern  desert,  “  and  judge,  like  a  wise  man,  for  thyself  !  ” 

As  he  spoke,  a  long  arrow  of  level  light  fiashed  down  the  gorge, 
from  crag  to  crag,  awakening  every  crack  and  slab  to  vividness  and 
life.  The  great  crimson  sun  rose  swiftly  through  the  dim  night-mist 
of  the  desert,  and  as  he  poured  his  glory  down  the  glen,  the  haze  rose  / 
in  threads  and  plumes,  and  vanished,  leaving  the  stream  to  sparkle 
round  the  rocks,  like  the  living,  twinkling  eye  of  the  whole  scene. 
Swallows  flashed  by  hundreds  out  of  the  cliffs,  and  began  their  air- 
dance  for  the  day  ;  the  jerboa  hopped  stealthily  homeward  on  his 
stilts  from  his  stolen  meal  in  the  monastery  garden  ;  the  brown  sand - 
lizards  underneath  the  stones  opened  one  eyelid  each,  and,  having 
satisfied  themselves  that  it  was  day,  dragged  their  bloated  bodies  and 
whip-like  tails  out  into  the  most  burning  patch  of  gravel  which  they 
could  find,  and,  nestling  together  as  a  further  protection  against  cold,  . 
fell  fast  asleep  again  ;  the  buzzard,  who  considered  himself  lord  o:[  ^ 
the  valley,  awoke  with  a  long,  querulous  bark,  and  rising  aloft  in  tw<|  P 
or  three  vast  rings,  to  stretch  himself  after  his  night’s  sleep,  hun^t  / 
motionless,  watching  every  lark  which  chirruped  on  the  cliffs  ;  whilJ 
from  the  far-off  Nile  below,  the  awakening  croak  of  pelicans,  th^'/ 
clang  of  geese,  the  whistle  of  the  godwitand  curlew,  came  ringing  ujJ  V 
the  windings  of  the  glen  ;  and  last  of  all  the  voices  of  the  monk^  v 
rose ,  chanting  a  morning  hymn  to  some  wild  Eastern  air  ;  and  a  new 
day  had  begun  in  Scetis,  like  those  which  went  before,  and  those  ' 
vdiich  were  to  follow  after,  week  after  week,  year  after  year,  of  toil 
and  prayer  as  quiet  as  its  sleep. 


yr  O' 


THE  LAURA  AGAIJT. 


127 


Wliat  does  tliat  teach  thee,  Aufugus,  my  friend  ?  ” 

Arsenins  was  silent. 

“To  me  it  teaches  this  :  that  God  is  light  and  in  Him  is  no  dark¬ 
ness  at  all.  That  in  His  presence  is  life,  and  fullness  of  joy  for  ever¬ 
more.  That  He  is  the  giver,  who  delights  in  His  own  bounty ;  the 
lover,  whose  mercy  is  over  all  His  works, — and  why  not  over  thee, 
too,  O  thou  of  little  faith  ?  Look  at  those  thousand  birds, — and  with¬ 
out  our  Father  not  one  of  them  shall  fall  to  the  ground  :  and  art  thou 
not  of  more  value  than  many  sparrows,  thou  for  whom  God  sent  his 
Son  to  die  !. .  .  .Ah,  my  friend,  we  must  look  out  and  around,  to  see 
what  God  is  like.  It  is  when  we  persist  in  turning  our  eyes  inward, 
and  prying  curiously  over  our  own  imperfections,  that  we  learn  to 
make  a  God  after  our  own  image,  and  fancy  that  our  own  darkness 
and  hardness  of  heart  are  the  patterns  of  His  light  and  love.” 

“  Thou  speakest  rather  as  a  philosopher  than  as  a  penitent  Catholic. 
For  me,  I  feel  that  I  want  to  look  more,  and  not  less,  inward.  Deeper 
self-examination,  completer  abstraction,  than  I  can  attain  even  here, 
are  what  I  crave  for.  I  long — forgive  me,  my  friend — but  I  long, 
more  and  more,  daily,  for  the  solitary  life.  This  earth  is  accursed  by 
man’s  sin  :  the  less  we  see  of  it,  it  seems  to  me,  the  better.” 

“  I  may  speak  as  a  philosopher,  or  as  a  heathen  for  aught  I  know  : 
yet  it  seems  to  me  that,  as  they  say,  the  half-loaf  is  better  than  none  ; 
that  the  wise  man  will  make  tlie  best  of  what  he  has,  and  throw  away 
no  lesson  because  the  book  is  somewhat  torn  and  soiled.  The  earth 
teaches  me  thus  far  already.  Shall  1  shut  my  eyes  to  those  invisible 
things  of  God  which  are  clearly  manifested  by  the  things  which  are 
made,  because  some  day  they  will  be  more  clearly  manifested  than 
now?  But  as  for  more  abstraction,  are  we  so  worldly  here  in 
Scetis  ?  ” 

“  Nay,  my  friend,  each  man  has  surely  his  vocation,  and  for  each 
some  peculiar  method  of  life  is  more  edifying  than  another.  In  my 
case,  the  habits  of  mind  which  I  acquired  in  the  world  will  cling  to 
me  in  spite  of  myself  even  here.  I  cannot  help  watching  the  doings 
of  others,  studying  their  characters,  planning  and  plotting  for  them, 
trying  to  prognosticate  their  future  fate.  Not  a  word,  not  a  gesture 
of  this  our  little  family,  but  turns  away  my  mind  from  the  one  thing 
needful.” 

“  And  do  you  fancy  that  the  anchorite  in  his  cell  has  fewer  dis¬ 
tractions  ?  ” 

“  What  can  he  have  but  the  supj^ly  of  the  mere  necessary  wants  of 
life  ;  and  them,  even,  he  may  abridge  to  the  gathering  of  a  few  roots 
and  herbs.  Men  have  lived  like  the  beasts  already,  that  they  might 
at  the  same  time  live  like  the  angels, — and  why  should  not  I  also  ?  ” 

“  And  thou  art  the  wise  man  of  the  world, — the  student  of  the 
hearts  of  others, — the  anatomizer  of  thine  own  ?  Hast  thou  not  found 
out  that,  beside  a  craving  stomach,  man  carries  with  him  a  corrupt 
heart  ? — Many  a  man  I  have  seen,  who,  in  his  haste  to  fly  from  the 

i 


1 


128 


HYPATIA. 


fiends  without  him,  has  forgotten  to  close  the  door  of  his  heart  against 
worse  fiends  who  were  ready  to  harbor  within  him.  Many  a  monk, 
friend,  changes  his  place,  but  not  the  anguish  of  his  soul.  I  have 
known  those  who,  driven  to  feed  on  their  own  thoughts  in  solitude, 
have  desperately  cast  themselves  from  cliffs,  or  ripped  up  their  own 
bodies,  in  the  longing  to  escape  from  thoughts,  from  which  one  com¬ 
panion,  one  kindly  voice,  might  have  deAvered  them.  I  have  known 
those,  too,  who  have  been  so  puffed  up  by  those  very  penances  which 
were  meant  to  humble  them,  that  tlioy  have  despised  all  means  of 
grace,  as  though  they  were  already  perfect,  and,  refusing  even  the 
holy  Eucharist,  have  lived  in  self -glorying  dreams  and  visions  sug¬ 
gested  by  the  evil  spirits.  One  such  I  knew,  who,  in  the  madness  of  his 
pride,  refused  to  be  counseled  by  any  mortal  man, — saying  that  he 
would  call  no  man  master  :  and  what  befell  him  ?  He  who  used  to 
pride  himself  on  wandering  a  day’s  journey  into  the  desert  without 
food  or  drink,  who  boasted  that  he  could  sustain  life  for  three 
months  at  a  time  only  on  wild  herbs  and  the  Blessed  Bread,  seized 
with  an  inward  fire,  fled  from  his  cell  back  to  the  theaters,  the  circus, 
and  the  taverns,  and  ended  his  miserable  days  in  desperate  gluttony, 
holding  all  things  to  be  phantasms,  denying  his  own  existence,  and 
that  of  God  himself.” 

Arsenius  shook  his  head. 

“  Be  it  so.  But  my  case  is  different.  I  have  yet  more  to  confess, 
my  friend.  Day  by  day  I  am  more  and  more  haunted  by  the  remem¬ 
brance  of  that  world  from  which  I  fled.  I  know  that  if  I  returned  I 
should  feel  no  pleasure  in  those  pomps  which,  even  while  I  battened 
on  them,  I  despised.  Can  I  hear  any  more  the  voice  of  singing  men  and 
singing  women  ;  or  discern  any  longer  what  I  eat  or  what  I  drink  ?  And 
yet — the  palaces  of  those  seven  hills,  their  statesmen  and  their  gen¬ 
erals,  their  intrigues,  their  falls,  and  their  triumphs, — for  they  might 
rise  and  conquer  yet  ! — for  no  moment  are  they  out  of  my  imagina¬ 
tion, — no  moment  in  which  they  are  not  tempting  me  back  to  them, 
like  a  moth  to  the  candle  which  has  already  scorched  him,  with  a 
dreadful  spell,  which  I  must  at  last  obey,  wretch  that  I  am,  against 
my  own  will,  or  break  by  fleeing  into  some  outer  desert,  from  whence 
return  will  be  impossible  !  ” 

Pambo  smiled. 

‘  ‘  Again  I  say  this  is  the  worldly-wise  man,  the  searcher  of  hearts  ! 
And  he  would  fain  flee  from  the  little  Laura,  which  does  turn  his 
thoughts  at  times  from  such  vain  dreams,  to  a  solitude  where  he  will 
be  utterly  unable  to  escape  those  dreams.  Well,  friend? — and  what 
if  thou  art  troubled  at  times  by  anxieties  and  schemes  fortius  brother 
and  for  that  ?  Better  to  be  anxious  for  others  than  only  for  thyself. 
Better  to  have  something  to  love  —  even  something  to  weep  over — 
than  to  become  in  some  lonely  cavern  thine  own  world, — perhaps,  as 
more  than  one  whom  I  have  known,  thine  own  God.” 

“Do  you  know  what  you  are  saying?”  asked  Arsenius,  in  a 
startled  tone. 


129 


TBB  LAURA  AG  AW. 

**  I  say,  tliatby  fleeing  into  solitude  a  man  cuts  liimself  off  from  all 
wliicli  makes  a  Christian  man  ;  from  law,  obedience,  fellow-help, 
self-sacrifice, — from  the  communion  of  saints  itself,” 

‘  ‘  How  then  ?  ” 

“  Howcanst  thou  hold  communion  with  those  toward  whom  thou 
canst  show  no  love?  And  how  canst  thou  show  thy  love  but  by 
works  of  love  ?  ” 

“  I  can,  at  least,  pray  day  and  night  for  all  mankind.  Has  that  no 
place — or  rather,  has  it  not  the  mightiest  place — in  the  communion 
of  saints  ?  ” 

“  He  who  cannot  pray  for  his  brothers  whom  he  does  see,  and 
whose  sins  and  temptations  he  knows,  will  pray  but  dully,  my  friend 
Aufugus,  for  his  brothers  whom  he  does  not  see,  or  for  anything 
else.  And  he  who  will  not  labor  for  his  brothers,  the  same  will  soon 
cease  to  pray  for  them,  or  love  them  either.  And  then,  what  is 
written  ?  ‘  If  a  man  love  not  his  brother  whom  he  hath  seen,  how 

will  he  love  God  whom  he  hath  not  seen  ?  ’  ” 

“Again,  I  say,  do  you  know  whither  your  argument  leads  ?” 

“  I  am  a  plain  man,  and  know  nothing  about  arguments.  If  a 
thing  be  true,  let  it  lead  where  it  will,  for  it  leads  where  God 
wills.” 

“  But  at  this  rate,  it  were  better  for  a  man  to  take  a  wife,  and 
have  children,  and  mix  himself  up  in  all  the  turmoil  of  carnal  affec¬ 
tions,  in  order  to  have  as  many  as  possible  to  love,  and  fear  for,  and 
work  for.” 

Pambo  was  silent  a  while. 

“  lam  a  monk,  and  no  logician.  But  this  I  say,  that  thou  lea  vest 
not  the  Laura  for  the  desert  with  my  good-will.  I  would  rather,  had 
1  my  wish,  see  they  wisdom  installed  somewhere  nearer  the  metrop¬ 
olis, — at  Troe  or  Canopus,  for  example,— where  thou  mightest  be 
at  hand  to  fight  the  Lord’s  battles.  Why  wert  thou  taught  worldly 
wisdom,  but  to  use  it  for  the  good  of  the  Church  ?  It  is  enough.  Let 
us  go.” 

And  the  two  old  men  walked  homeward  across  the  valley,  little 
guessing  the  practical  answer  which  was  ready  for  their  argument, 
in  Abbot  Pambo’s  cell,  in  the  shape  of  a  tall  and  grim  ecclesiastic, 
who  was  busily  satisfying  his  hunger  with  dates  and  millet,  and  by 
no  means  refusing  the  palm- wine,  the  sole  delicacy  of  the  monastery, 
which  had  been  brought  forth  only  in  honor  of  a  guest. 

The  stately  and  courteous  hospitality  of  Eastern  manners,  as  well 
as  the  self-restraining  kindliness  of  monastic  Christianity,  forbade 
the  abbot  to  interrupt  the  stranger  ;  and  it  was  not  till  he  liad  finished 
a  hearty  meal  that  Pambo  asked  his  name  and  errand. 

“  My  unworthiness  is  called  Peter  the  Header.  I  come  from  Cyril, 
with  letters  and  messages  to  the  brother  Aufugus.” 

Pambo  rose,  and  bowed  reverentially. 

I  “We  have  heard  your  good  report,  sir,  as  of  one  zealously  affected 
(  HYPATIA — 5 


130  BTPATIA. 

in  the  cause  of  the  Church  Catholic.  Will  it  please  you  to  follow  us 
to  the  cell  of  Aufugus  ?  ” 

Peter  stalked  after  them  Avith  a  sufficiently  important  air  to  the 
little  hut,  and  there,  taking  from  his  bosom  Cyril’s  epistle,  handed 
it  to  Arsenius,  who  sat  long,  reading  and  re-reading  with  a.,  clouded 
brow,  while  Pambo  watched  him  with  simple  awe,  not  daring  to 
interrupt  by  a  question  lucubrations  which  he  considered  of  unfathom¬ 
able  depth. 

“  These  are  indeed  the  last  days,”  said  Arsenius,  at  length, 
“  spoken  of  by  the  prophet,  Avhen  many  shall  run  to  and  fro.  So 
Heraclian  has  actually  sailed  for  Italy  ?” 

“  His  armament  was  met  on  the  high  seas  by  Alexandrian  mer¬ 
chantmen,  three  weeks  ago,” 

“  And  Orestes  hardens  his  heart  more  and  more  ?  ” 

“  Ay,  Pharaoh  that  he  is  ;  or  rather,  the  heathen  woman  hardens 
it  for  him.” 

“  I  always  feared  that  woman  above  all  the  schools  of  the  heathen,” 
said  Arsenius.  “  But  the  Count  Heraclian,  whom  I  always  held  for 
the  wisest  as  \vell  as  the  most  righteous  of  men  !  Alas  !  alas  !  what 
virtue  will  withstand,  when  ambition  enters  the  heart  ?  ” 

“Fearful,  truly,”  said  Peter,  “  is  that  same  lust  of  power:  but 
for  him,  I  have  never  trusted  him  since  he  began  to  be  indulgent  to 
those  Donatists.” 

“  Too  true.  So  does  one  sin  beget  another.” 

“  And  I  consider  that  indulgence  to  sinners  is  the  worst  of  all  sins 
whatsoever.” 

“Not  of  all,  surely,  reverend  sir?”  said  Pambo,  humbly.  But 
Peter,  taking  no  notice  of  the  interruption,  went  on  to  Arsenius, — 

“  And  now,  what  answer  am  I  to  bear  back  from  your  wisdom  to 
his  holiness  ?  ” 

“  Let  me  see, — let  me  see.  He  might — it  needs  consideration — I 
ought  to  know  more  of  the  state  of  parties.  He  has,  of  course, 
communicated  with  the  African  bishops,  and  tried  to  unite  them  with 
him  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  Two  months  ago.  But  the  stiff-necked  schismatics  are  still  jeal¬ 
ous  of  him,  and  hold  aloof.” 

“  Schismatics  is  too  harsh  a  term,  my  friend.  But  has  he  sent  to 
Constantinople  ?  ” 

“  He  needs  a  messenger  accustomed  to  courts.  It  was  possible,  he 
thought,  that  your  experience  might  undertake  the  mission.” 

“Me?  Who  am  I?  Alas!  alas!  fresh  temptation  daily!  Let 

him  send  by  the  hand  of  whom  he  will . And  yet — were  I — at 

least  in  Alexandria — I  might  advise  from  day  to  day . I  should 

certainly  see  my  way  clearer . And  unforeseen  chances  might  arise, 

too . Pambo,  my  friend,  thinkest  thou  that  it  would  be  sinful  to 

obey  the  holy  patriarch  ?  ” 

“Aha  !  ”  said  Pambo,  laughing,  “and  thou  art  he  who  was  for 


THE  LAURA  AGAIN. 


IBI 


fleeing-  into  tlie  desert  an  hour  agone  ?  And  now  when  once  thou 
smellest  the  battle  afar  off,  thou  art  pawing  in  the  valley  like  the  old 
war-horse.  Go,  and  God  be  with  thee  !  Thou  wilt  be  none  the  worse 
for  it.  Thou  art  too  old  to  fall  in  love,  too  poor  to  buy  a  bishopric, 
and  too  righteous  to  have  one  given  thee.” 

“  Art  thou  in  earnest  ?  ” 

“  What  did  I  say  to  thee  in  the  garden  ?  Go,  and  see  our  son,  and 
send  me  news  of  him.” 

“  Ah  !  shame  on  my  worldly-mindedness  !  I  had  forgotten  all  this 
time  to  inquire  for  him.  How  is  the  youth,  reverend  sir  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  Whom  do  you  mean  ?  ” 

“Philammon,  our  spiritual  son,  whom  we  sent  down  to  you  three 
months  ago,”  said  Pambo.  “  Risen  to  honor  he  is,  by  this  time,  I 
doubt  not  ?  ” 

“He?  He  is  gone  !  ” 

“  Gone?” 

“  Ay,  the  wretch,  with  the  curse  of  Judas  on  him.  He  had  not 
been  with  us  three  days  before  he  beat  me  openly  in  the  patriarch’s 
court,  cast  off  the  Christian  faith,  and  tied  away  to  the  heathen  wo¬ 
man,  Hypatia,  of  whom  he  is  enamored.” 

The  two  old  men  looked  at  each  other  with  blank  and  horror- 
stricken  faces. 

“  Enamored  of  Hypatia?”  said  Arsenins,  at  last. 

“  It  is  impossible  !  ”  sobbed  Pambo,  “  The  boy  must  have  been 
treated  harshly,  unjustly  !  Some  one  has  wronged  him  ;  and  he  was 
accustomed  only  to  kindness,  and  so  could  not  bear  it.  Cruel  men 
that  you  are,  and  unfaithful  stewards  !  The  Lord  will  require  the 
child’s  blood  at  your  hands  !  ” 

“Ay,”  said  Peter,  rising  fiercely,  “that  is  the  world’s  justice  ! 
Blame  me,  blame  the  patriarch,  blame  any  and  every  one  but  the  sin¬ 
ner  !  As  if  a  hot  head  and  a  hotter  heart  were  not  enough  to  explain 
it  all  !  As  if  a  young  fool  had  never  before  been  bewitched  by  a 
fair  face  !  ” 

“  O  my  friends,  my  friends,”  cried  Arsenins,  “why  revile  each 
other  without  cause?  I,  I  only  am  to  blame.  I  advised  you,  Pambo! 
— I  sent  him — I  ought  to  have  known — what  was  I  doing,  old  world¬ 
ling  that  I  am,  to  thrust  the  poor  innocent  forth  into  the  temptations 
of  Babylon  ?  This  comes  of  all  my  schemings  and  my  plottings  I 
And  now  his  blood  will  be  on  my  head — as  if  I  had  not  sins  enough 
to  bear  already,  I  must  go  and  add  this  over  and  above  all,  to  sell  my 
own  Joseph,  the  son  of  my  old  age  to  the  Midianites  I  Here,  I  will 
go  with  you — now — at  once — I  will  not  rest  till  I  find  him,  clasp  his 
knees  till  he  pities  my  gray  hairs  !  Let  Heraclian  and  Orestes  go 
their  way  for  aught  I  care — I  will  find  him,  I  say.  0  Absalom!  my 
J5on  !  would  God  I  had  died  for  thee  my  son  1  my  son  I  ” 


CHAPTER  XII. 


THE  BOWEK  OF  ACRASIA. 

The  house  which  Pelagia  and  the  Amal  had  hired  after  their  re¬ 
turn  to  Alexandria,  was  one  of  the  most  splendid  in  the  city.  They 
had  been  now  living  there  three  months  or  more,  and  in  that  time 
Pelagia’s  taste  had  supplied  the  little  which  it  needed  to  convert  it 
into  a  paradise  of  lazy  luxury.  She  herself  was  wealthy  ;  and  her 
Gothic  guests,  overburdened  with  Roman  spoils,  the  very  use  of 
which  they  could  not  understand,  freely  allowed  her  and  her  nymphs 
to  throw  away  for  them  the  treasures  which  they  had  won  in  many  a 
fearful  fight.  What  matter  !  If  they  had  enough  to  eat,  and  more 
than  enough  to  drink,  how  could  the  useless  surplus  of  their  riches 
be  better  spent  than  in  keeping  their  ladies  in  good  humor?. . . .  And 
when  it  was  all  gone. . .  .they  would  go  somewhere  or  other, — who 
cared  whither  ! — and  win  more.  The  whole  world  was  before  them 
waiting  to  be  plundered,  and  they  would  fulfill  their  mission,  when¬ 
soever  it  suited  them.  In  the  mean  time  they  were  in  no  hurry. 
Egypt  furnished  in  profusion  every  sort  of  food  which  could  gratify 
palates  far  more  nice  than  theirs.  And  as  for  wine, — few  of  them 
went  to  bed  sober  from  one  week’s  end  to  another.  Could  the  souls 
of  warriors  have  more,  even  in  the  halls  of  Valhalla  ? 

So  thought  the  party  who  occupied  the  inner  court  of  the  house, 
one  blazing  afternoon  in  the  same  week  in  which  Cyril’s  messenger 
had  so  rudely  broken  in  on  the  repose  of  the  Scetis 

Their  repose,  at  least,  was  still  untouched.  The  great  city  roared 
without  ;  Orestes  plotted,  and  Cyril  counterplotted,  and  the  fate  of  a 
continent  hung — or  seemed  to  hang — trembling  in  the  balance  ;  but  the 
turmoil  of  it  all  no  more  troubled  those  lazy  Titans  within,  than  did 
the  roll  and  rattle  of  the  carriage- wheels  disturb  the  parakeets  and 
sun-birds  who  peopled,  under  an  awning  of  gilded  wire,  the  inner 
court  of  Pelagia’s  house.  Why  should  they  fret  themselves  with 
it  all  ?  What  was  every  fresh  riot,  execution,  conspiracy,  bank¬ 
ruptcy,  but  a  sign  that  the  fruit  was  growing  ripe  for  the  plucking  ? 
Even  Heraclian’s  rebellion,  and  Orestes’s  suspected  conspiracy,  were 
to  the  younger  and  coarser  Goths  a  sort  of  child’s  play,  at  which 
they  could  look  on,  and  laugh,  and  bet  from  morning  to  night;  while  to 
the  more  cunning  heads,  such  as  Wulf  and  Smid,  they  were  but  signs 
of  the  general  rottenness — new  cracks  in  those  great  walls,  over 
which  they  intended,  with  a  simple  and  boyish  consciousness  of 
power,  to  mount  to  victory  when  they  chose. 

( 132 ) 


The  bower  of  acrasia.  iss 

And  in  tlie  mean  time,  till  the  right  opening  offered,  what  was 
there  better  than  to  eat,  drink,  and  sleep  ?  And  certainly  they  had 
chosen  a  charming  retreat  in  which  to  fulfill  that  lofty  mission. 
Columns  of  purple  and  green  porphyry,  among  which  gleamed  the 
white  limbs  of  delicate  statues,  surrounded  a  basin  of  water,  fed  by 
a  perpetual  jet,  which  sprinkled  with  cool  spray  the  leaves  of  the 
oranges  and  mimosas,  mingling  its  murmurs  with  the  warblings  of 
the  tropic  birds  who  nestled  among  the  branches. 

On  one  side  of  the  fountain,  under  the  shade  of  a  broad-leaved 
palmetto,  lay  the  Amal’s  mighty  limbs,  stretched  out  on  cushions, 
his  yellow  hair  crowned  with  vine-leaves,  his  hand  grasping  a  golden 
cup,  which  had  been  won  from  Indian  Rajahs  by  Parthian  Chosroos, 
from  Chosroos  by  Roman  generals,  from  Roman  generals  by  the 
heroes  of  sheep -skin  and  horse-hide  ;  while  Pelagia,  by  the  side  of 
the  sleepy  Hercules-Dionysos,  lay  leaning  over  the  brink  of  the 
fountain,  lazily  dipping  her  fingers  into  the  water,  and  basking,  like 
the  gnats  which  hovered  over  its  surface,  in  the  mere  pleasure  of 
existence. 

On  the  opposite  brink  of  the  basin,  tended  each  by  a  dark-eyed 
Hebe,  who  filled  the  wine-cups,  and  helped  now  and  then  to  empty 
them,  lay  the  especial  friends  and  companions  in  arms  of  the  Amal, 
Goderic  the  son  of  Ermenric,  and  Agilmund  the  son  of  Cniva,  who 
both,  like  the  Amal,  boasted  a  descent  from  gods  ;  and  last,  but  not 
least,  that  most  important  and  all  but  sacred  personage,  Smid  the 
son  of  Troll,  reverenced  for  cunning  beyond  the  sons  of  men  ;  for  not 
only  could  he  make  and  mend  all  matters,  from  a  pontoon  bridge  to 
a  gold  bracelet,  shoe  horses  and  doctor  them,  charm  all  diseases  out 
of  man  and  beast,  carve  runes,  interpret  war-omens,  foretell  weather, 
raise  the  winds,  and,  finally,  conquer  in  the  battle  of  mead-horns  all 
except  Wulf  the  son  of  Ovida  ;  but  he  had  actually,  during  a  sojourn 
among  the  half-civilized  Maesogoths,  picked  up  a  fair  share  of  Latin 
and  Greek,  and  a  rough  knowledge  of  reading  and  writing. 

A  few  yards  off  lay  old  Wulf  upon  his  back,  his  knees  in  the  air, 
his  hands  crossed  behind  his  head,  keeping  up,  even  in  his  sleep,  a 
half-conscious  comment  of  growls  on  the  following  intellectual  con¬ 
versation  : — 

“  Noble  wine  this,  is  it  not  ?  ” 

“  Perfect.  Who  bought  it  for  us  ?  ” 

“Old  Miriam  bought  it,  at  some  great  tax-farmer’s  sale.  The 
fellow  was  bankrupt,  and  Miriam  said  she  got  it  for  the  half  what  it 
was  worth.” 

“  Serve  the  penny-turning  rascal  right.  The  old  vixen-fox  took 
care,  I’ll  warrant  her,  to  get  her  profit  out  of  the  bargain.” 

“  Never  mind  if  she  did.  We  can  afford  to  pay  like  men,  if  we 
earn  like  men.” 

“We  sha’n’t  afford  it  long,  at  this  rate,”  growled  Wulf. 

“  Then  we’ll  go  and  earn  more.  I  am  tired  of  doing  nothing.” 


134 


HYPATIA 


“  People  need  not  do  nothing,  unless  they  choose,”  said  Goderic. 
“  Wulf  and  I  had  coursing  fit  for  a  king,  the  other  morning,  on  the 
sand-hills.  I  had  had  no  appetite  for  a  week  before,  and  I  have  been 
as  sharp-set  as  a  Danube  piJie  ever  since.” 

“Coursing?  What,  with  those  long-legged,  brush-tailed  brutes, 
like  a  fox  upon  stilts,  which  the  prefect  cozened  you  into  buying  ?  ” 

“  All  I  can  say  is  that  we  put  up  a  herd  of  those — what  do  they 
call  them  here — deer  with  goat’s  horns  ?  ” 

“  Antelopes?  ” 

“That’s  it, — and  the  curs  ran  into  them  as  a  falcon  does  into  a 
skein  of  ducks.  Wulf  and  I  galloped  and  galloped  over  those  ac¬ 
cursed  sand-heaps  till  the  horses  stuck  fast  ;  and  when  they  got  their 
wind  again,  we  found  each  pair  of  dogs  with  a  deer  down  between 
them, — and  what  can  man  want  more — if  he  cannot  get  fighting? 
You  eat  them,  so  you  need  not  sp,eer.” 

“Well,  dogs  are  the  only  things  worth  having,  then,  that  this 
Alexandria  does  produce.” 

“  Except  fair  ladies  !”  put  in  one  of  the  girls. 

“  Of  course.  I’ll  except  the  women.  But  the  men - ” 

“  The  what?  I  have  not  seen  a  man  since  I  came  here,  except  a 
dock-worker  or  two, — priests  and  fine  gentlemen  they  are  all, — and 
you  don’t  call  them  men,  surely  ?  ” 

“What  on  earth  do  they  do,  beside  riding  donkeys?” 

“Philosophize,  they  say.” 

What’s  that  ?  ” 

“  I’m  sure  I  don’t  know  :  some  sort  of  slave’s  quill-driving,  I  sup¬ 
pose.” 

“  Pelagia  !  do  you  know  what  philosophizing  is  ?  ” 

“No, — and  I  don’t  care.” 

“  I  do,”  quoth  Agilmund  with  a  look  of  superior  wisdom  ;  “I  saw 
a  philosopher  the  other  day.” 

“  And  what  sort  of  a  thing  was  it  ?  ” 

“  I’ll  tell  you.  I  was  walking  down  the  great  street,  there,  going 
to  the  harbor  ;  and  I  saw  a  crowd  of  boys — men,  they  call  them 
here — going  into  a  larg-e  doorway.  So  I  asked  one  of  them  what  was 
doing,  and  the  fellow,  instead  of  answering  me,  pointed  at  my  legs, 
and  set  all  the  other  monkeys  laughing.  So  I  boxed  his  ears,  and  he 
tumbled  down.” 

“  They  all  do  so  here,  if  you  box  their  ears,”  said  the  Amal,  medi¬ 
tatively,  as  if  he  had  hit  upon  a  great  inductive  law. 

“  Ah,”  said  Pelagia,  looking  up  with  her  most  winning  smile, 
“  they  are  not  such  giants  as  you,  who  make  a  poor  little  woman  feel 
like  a  gazelle  in  the  lion’s  paw  !  ” 

“Well, — it  struck  me  that,  as  I  spoke  in  Gothic,  the  boy  might 
not  have  understood  me,  being  a  Greek.  So  I  walked  in  at  the  door, 
to  save  questions,  and  see  for  myself.  And  there  a  fellow  held  out 
Ms  hand, — I  suppose  for  money.  So  I  gave  him  two  or  three  gold 


THE  BO  WEB  OP  AOBASIA.  135 

pieces,  and  a  box  on  tlie  ear,  at  which  he  tumbled  down,  of  course, 
but  seemed  very  well  satisfied.  So  I  walked  in.” 

“  And  what  did  you  see  ?  ” 

“  A  great  hall  large  enough  for  a  thousand  heroes,  full  of  these 
Egyptian  rascals  scribbling  with  pencils  on  tablets.  And  at  the 
farther  end  of  it,  the  most  beautiful  woman  I  ever  saw, — with  right 
fair  hair  and  blue  eyes,  talking,  talking, — I  could  not  understand  it  ; 
but  the  donkey-riders  seemed  to  think  it  very  fine  ;  for  they  went  on 
looking  first  at  her,  and  then  at  their  tablets,  gaping  like  frogs  in 
drought.  And,  certainly,  she  looked  as  fair  as  the  sun,  and  talked 
like  an  Alruna  wife.  Not  that  I  knew  what  it  was  about,  but  one 
can  see  somehow,  you  know. — So  I  fell  asleep  ;  and  when  I  woke, 
and  came  out,  I  met  some  one  who  understood  me,  and  he  told  me 
that  it  was  the  famous  maiden,  the  great  philosopher.  And  that’s 
what  I  know  about  philosophy.” 

“  She  was  very  much  wasted,  then,  on  such  soft-handed  starve¬ 
lings.  Why  don’t  she  marry  some  hero  ?  ” 

“  Because  there  are  none  here  to  marry,”  said  Pelagia;  “except 
some  who  are  fast  netted,  I  fancy,  already.  ” 

“But  what  do  they  talk  about,  and  tell  people  to  do,  these  phi¬ 
losophers,  Pelagia?” 

“  O,  they  don’t  tell  any  one  to  do  anything, — at  least,  if  they  do, 
nobody  ever  does  it,  as  far  as  I  can  see  ;  but  they  talk  about  suns 
and  stars,  and  right  and  wrong,  and  ghosts  and  spirits,  and  that  sort 
of  thing  ;  and  atout  not  enjoying  one’s  self  too  much.  Not  that  I 
ever  saw  that  they  were  any  happier  than  any  one  else.” 

“  She  must  have  been  an  Alruna  maiden,”  said  Wulf,  half  to  him¬ 
self. 

“  She  is  a  very  conceited  creature,  and  I  hate  her,”  said  Pelagia. 

“  I  believe  you,”  said  Wulf. 

“  What  is  an  Alruna  maiden?  ”  asked  one  of  the  girls. 

“  Something  as  like  you  as  a  salmon  is  like  a  horseleech.  Heroes, 
will  you  hear  a  saga  ?  ” 

“  If  it  is  a  cool  one,”  said  Agilmund  ;  “  about  ice,  and  pine-trees, 
and  snow-storms.  I  shall  be  roasted  brown  in  three  days  more.” 

“  Oh  !  ”  said  the  Amal,  “  that  we  were  on  the  Alps  again  for  only 
two  hours,  sliding  down  those  snow-slopes  on  our  shields,  with  the 
sleet  whistling  about  our  ears  !  That  was  sport  !  ” 

“  To  those  who  could  keep  their  seat,”  said  Goderic.  “  Who  went 
head  over  heels  into  a  glacier-crack,  and  was  dug  out  of  fifty  feet  of 
snow,  and  had  to  be  put  inside  a  fresh-killed  horse  before  he  could 
be  brought  to  life  ?  ” 

“Not  you,  surely,”  said  Pelagia.  “O  you  wonderful  creature! 
what  things  you  have  done  and  suffered  I  ” 

“Well,”  said  the  Amal,  with  a  look  of  stolid  self-satisfaction,  “  I 
suppose  I  have  seen  a  good  deal  in  my  time,  eh  ?  ” 

“  Yes,  my  Hercules  ;  you  have  gone  through  your  twelve  labors, 


18^ 


UtPATlA. 

and  saved  your  poor  little  Hesione  after  them  all,  when  she  wa§ 
chained  to  the  rock,  for  the  ugly  sea-monsters  to  eat  ;  and  she  will 
cherish  you,  and  keep  you  out  of  scrapes  now,  for  her  own  sake 
and  Pelagia  threw  lier  arms  round  the  great  bull-neck,  and  drew  it 
down  to  her. 

“  Will  you  hear  my  saga?  ”  said  Wulf,  impatiently. 

“Of  course  we  will,”  said  the  Amal ;  “anything  to  pass  the 
time.” 

“  But  let  it  be  about  snow,”  said  Agilmund. 

“Not  about  Alruna  wives ? ” 

“  About  them  too,”  said  Goderic  ;  “  my  mother  was  one,  so  I  must 
needs  stand  up  for  them.” 

“  She  was,  boy.  Do  you  be  her  son.  Now  hear.  Wolves  of  the 
Goths  !  ” 

And  the  old  man  took  up  his  little  lute,  or,  as  he  would  probably 
have  called  it,  “Mel,”  and  began  chanting  to  his  own  accompani¬ 
ment. 


Over  the  camp-fires 
Drank  I  with  heroes, 

Under  the  Donau  bank 
Warm  in  the  snow-trench*. 
Sagamen  heard  I  there, 

Men  of  the  Longbeards, 

Cunning  and  ancient. 
Honey-sweet- voiced. 

Scaring  the  wolf-cub, 

Scaring  the  horn-owl  out. 

Shaking  the  snow-wreaths 
Down  from  the  pine-boughs, 

Up  to  the  star-roof 
Rang  out  their  song. 

Singing  how  Winil  men. 

Over  the  ice-fioes 
Sledging  from  Scanland  on 
Came  unto  Scoring : 

Singing  of  Gambara 
Frey  a’ s  beloved, 

Mother  of  Ayo, 

Mother  of  Ibor. 

Singing  of  W  endel  men, 

Ambri  and  Assi ; 

How  to  the  Winilfolk 
Went  they  with  war- words. — 

“  Few  are  ye,  strangers, 

And  many  are  we  ; 

Pay  us  now  toll  and  fee, 
Clothyarn,  and  rings,  and  beeves; 
Else  at  the  raven’s  meal 
Bide  the  sharp  bill’s  doom.” 

Clutching  the  dwarf’s  work,  then, 
Clutching  the  bullock’s  shell. 
Girding  gray  iron  on , 

Forth  fared  the  Winil s  all. 

Fared  the  Alruna’s  sons. 


THE  BOWER  OF  AGRAbiA. 


187 


Ayo  and  Ibor. 

Mad  of  heart  stalked  they  ; 

Loud  wept  the  women  all, 

Loud  wept  tbe  Alruna  wife  ; 

Sore  was  their  need. 

Out  of  the  morning  laud, 

Over  the  snow-drifts, 

Beautiful  Freya  came, 

Tripping  to  Scoring. 

White  were  the  moorlands 
And  frozen  before  her  ; 

But  green  were  the  moorlands, 
And  blooming  behind  her  ; 

Out  of  her  gmden  locks 
Shaking  the  spring  flowers, 

Out  of  her  garments 
Shaking  the  south  wind, 

Around  in  the  birches 
Awaking  the  throstles. 

And  making  chaste  housewives  all 
Long  for  their  heroes  home, 
Loving  and  love-giving. 

Came  she  to  Scoring. 

Came  unto  Gambara, 

Wisest  of  Valas, — 

“Vala,  why  weepestthou  ? 

Far  in  the  wide-blue, 

High  up  in  the  Elfln-home, 

Heard  I  thy  weeping.” 


“  Stop  not  my  weeping. 

Till  one  can  fight  seven. 

Sons  have  I,  heroes  tall. 

First  in  the  sword-play  ; 

This  day  at  the  Wendels’  hands 
Eagles  must  tear  them  ; 

While  their  mothers,  thrall-weary. 
Must  grind  for  the  Wendels.” 


Wept  the  Alruna  wife  ; 

Edssed  her  fair  Freya 
“  Far  off  in  the  morning  land. 

High  in  Valhalla, 

A  window  stands  open. 

Its  sill  is  the  snow-peaks. 

Its  posts  are  the  water-spouts, 
Storm-rack  its  lintel ; 

Gold  cloud-flakes  above  it 
Are  piled  for  the  roofing. 

Far  up  to  the  Elfin-home, 

High  in  the  wide-blue. 

Smiles  out  each  morning  thence 
Odin  Allfather  ; 

From  under  tne  cloud-eaves 
Smiles  out  on  the  heroes. 

Smiles  out  on  chaste  housewives  all 
Smiles  on  the  brood-mares. 

Smiles  on  the  smith’s  work  : 

And  theirs  is  the  sword-luck 


1S8 


HYPATIA. 


\ 


\ 


With  them  is  the  glory,— 

So  Odin  hath  sworn  it,— 

Who  first  in  the  morning 
Shall  meet  him  and  greet  him. 


still  the  Alruna  wept  , 

“  Who  then  shall  greet  him  i 
Women  alone  are  here  : 

Far  on  the  moorlands 
Behind  the  war-lindens. 

In  vain  for  the  bill’s  doom 
Watch  Winil  heroes  all. 

One  against  seven.” 


Sweetly  the  Queen  laughed: 
‘•Hear  thou  my  counsel  now  ; 
Take  to  thee  cunning. 

Beloved  of  Freya. 

Take  thou  thy  women-folk. 
Maidens  and  wives : 

Over  your  ankles 

Lace  on  the  white  war-hose  ; 

Over  your  bosoms 

Link  up  the  hard  mail-nets; 

Over  your  lips 

Plait  long  tresses  with  cunning  ; 
So  war-beasts  full-bearded 
King  Odin  shall  deem  you, 
When  off  the  gray  sea-beach 
At  sunrise  ye  greet  him.” 


Night’s  son  was  driving 
His  golden-haired  horses  up  ; 
Ovei  the  eastern  firths 
High  fiashed  their  manes. 

Smiled  from  the  cloud-eaves  out 
Allfather  Odin, 

Waiting  the  battle-sport : 

Freya  stood  by  him. 

“  Who  are  these  heroes  tall — 
Lusty  limbed  Longbeards  ? 

Over  the  swans’  bath 
Why  cry  they  to  me  ? 

Bones  should  be  crashing  fast, 
Wolves  should  be  full-fed, 
Where’er  such,  mad-hearted. 
Swing  hands  in  the  sword-play. 

Sweetly  laughed  Freya: 

“A  name  thou  hast  given  them 
Shames  neither  thee  nor  them. 
Well  can  they  wear  it. 

Give  them  the  victory,' 

First  have  they  greeted  thee; 
Give  them  the  victory. 
Yokefellow  mine  ! 

Maidens  and  wives  are  these,—- 
Wives  of  the  Winds  ; 

Few  are  their  heroes 


THE  BOWER  OF  AORASIA, 


139 


And  far  on  the  war-road. 

So  over  the  swans’  bath 
They  cry  unto  thee.” 

Royally  laughed  he  then; 

Dear  was  that  craft  to  him, 

Odin  Allfather, 

Shaking  the  clouds. 

“  Cunning  are  women  all, 

Bold  and  importunate  ! 

Longbeards  their  name  shall  be, 

Ravens  shall  thank  them: 

Where  the  women  are  heroes. 

What  must  the  men  belike  ? 

Theirs  is  the  victory  ; 

No  need  of  me  1  ”  * 

“  There  !”  said  Wulf,  when  the  song  was  ended,  “is  that  cool 
enough  for  you  ?  ” 

“  Rather  too  cool  ;  eh,  Pelagia  !  ”  said  the  Amal,  laughing. 

“  Ay,”  went  on  the  old  man,  bitterly  enough,  “  such  were  your 
mothers  ;  and  such  were  your  sisters  ;  and  such  your  wives  must  be, 
if  you  intend  to  last  much  longer  on  the  face  of  the  earth, — women 
who  cafe  for  something  better  than  good  eating,  strong  drinking,  and 
soft  lying.” 

“  All  very  true.  Prince  Wulf,”  said  Agilmund,  “  but  I  don’t  like 
the  saga,  after  all.  It  was  a  great  deal  too  like  what  Pelagia  here 
says  those  philosophers  talk  about, — right  and  wrong,  and  that  sort 
of  thing.” 

“  I  don’t  doubt  it.” 

“Now  I  like  a  really  good  saga,  about  gods  and  giants,  and  the 
fire  kingdoms,  and  the  snow  kingdoms,  and  the  ^sir  making  men 
and  women  out  of  two  sticks,  and  all  that.” 

“  Ay,”  cried  the  Amal,  “  something  like  nothing  one  ever  saw  in 
one’s  life,  all  stark-mad  and  topsy-turvy,  like  one’s  dreams  when  one 
has  been  drunk  ;  something  grand  which  you  cannot  understand, 
but  which  sets  you  thinking  over  it  all  the  morning  after.” 

“Well,”  said  God  eric,  “  my  mother  was  an  Alruna  woman,  so 
I  will  not  be  the  bird  to  foul  its  own  nest.  But  I  like  to  hear  about 
wild  beasts  and  ghosts,  ogres,  and  fire-drakes,  and  nicors, — some¬ 
thing  that  one  could  kill  if  one  had  a  chance,  as  one’s  fathers  had.” 

“  Your  fathers  would  never  have  killed  nicors,”  said  Wulf,  “if 
they  had  been - ” 

“  Like  us, — I  know,”  said  the  Amal.  “’Now  tell  me.  Prince,  you 
are  old  enough  to  be  our  father  ;  and  did  you  ever  see  a  nicor?” 

“My  brother  saw  one,  in  the  Northern  sea,  three  fathoms  long, 
with  the  body  of  a  bison-bull,  and  the  head  of  a  cat,  and  the  beard  of 

*  This  punning  legend  may  be  seen  in  Paul  Warnefrid’s  Oesta  Langobadorum. 
Unfortunately,  however,  for  the  story.  Langbardr  is  said  by  the  learned  to  have 
nothing  to  do  with  beards  at  all,  but  probably  to  mean  “  Longswords,”  The  meter 
and  language  are  intended  as  imitations  of  those  of  the  earlier  Eddaic  poems. 


140 


HYPATIA. 


a  man,  and  tusks  an  ell  long,  lying  down  on  its  breast,  watching  for  the 
fishermen  ;  and  he  struck  it  with  an  arrow,  so  that  it  fled  to  the  bot¬ 
tom  of  the  sea,  and  never  came  up  again.” 

“  What  is  a  nicor,  Agilmund  ?  ”  asked  one  of  the  girls. 

‘  ‘  A  sea-devil  who  eats  sailors.  There  used  to  be  plenty  of  them 
where  our  fathers  came  from,  and  ogres,  too,  who  came  out  of  the 
fens  into  the  hall  at  night,  when  the  warriors  were  sleeping,  to  suck 
their  blood,  and  steal  along,  and  steal  along,  and  jump  upon  you — 
so  !  ” 

Pelagia,  during  the  saga,  had  remained  looking  into  the  fountain, 
and  playing  with  the  water-drops  in  assumed  indifference.  Perhaps 
it  was  to  hide  burning  blushes,  and  something  very  like  two  hot  tears, 
which  fell  unobserved  into  the  ripple.  Now  she  looked  up  sud¬ 
denly,— 

“  And  of  course  you  have  killed  some  of  these  dreadful  creatures, 
Amalric  ?  ” 

“I  never  had  such  good  luck,  darling.  Our  forefathers  were  in 
such  a  hurry  with  them,  that  by  the  time  we  were  born  there  was 
hardly  one  left.” 

“Ay,  they  were  men,”  growled  Wulf. 

“As  for  me,”  went  on  the  Amal,  “the  biggest  thing  I  ever  killed 
was  a  snake  in  the  Donau  fens.  How  long  was  he.  Prince  ?  You  had 
time  to  see,  for  you  sat  eating  your  dinner  and  looking  on,  while  he 
was  trying  to  crack  my  bones.” 

“  Four  fathom,”  answered  Wulf. 

“  With  a  wild  bull  lying  by  him,  which  he  had  just  killed.  I 
spoiled  his  dinner,  eh,  Wulf?” 

“Yes,”  said  the  old  grumbler,  mollified,  “that  was  a  right  good 
fight.” 

“Why  don’t  you  make  a  saga  about  it,  then,  instead  of  about  right 
and  wrong,  and  such  things  ?  ” 

“  Because  I  am  turned  philosopher.  I  shall  go  and  hear  that  Alruna 
maiden  this  afternoon.” 

“Well  said.  Let  us  go,  too,  young  men  ;  it  will  pass  the  time,  at 
all  events.” 

“  O,  no  !  no  !  do  not !  you  shall  not !  ”  almost  shrieked  Pelagia. 

“  Why  not,  then,  pretty  one  ?  ” 

“  She  is  a  witch, — she — I  will  never  love  you  again  if  you  dare  to 
go.  Your  only  reason  is  that  Agilmund’s  report  of  her  beauty.” 

“  So  !  You  are  afraid  of  my  liking  her  golden  locks  better  than 
your  black  ones  ?  ” 

“I?  Afraid?”  And  she  leaped  up,  panting  with  pretty  rage. 
“  Come,  we  will  go  too, — at  once, — and  brave  this  nun,  who  fancies 
herself  too  wise  to  speak  to  a  woman,  and  too  pure  to  love  a  man  ! 
Look  out  my  jewels  !  Saddle  my  white  mule  !  We  will  go  royally. 
We  will  not  be  ashamed  of  cupid’s  livery,  my  girls — saffron  shawl 
and  all  !  Come,  and  let  us  see  whether  saucy  Aphrodite  is  not  a  match 
after  all  for  Pallas  Athene  and  her  owl  !  ” 


THE  BOWER  OF  AGBA81A. 


l4l 


And  slie  darted  out  of  the  cloister. 

The  three  younger  men  burst  into  a  roar  of  laughter,  while  Wulf 
looked  with  grim  approval. 

“So  you  want  to  go  and  hear  the  philosopher,  Prince?”  said 
Smid. 

“  Wheresoever  a  holy  and  a  wise  woman  speaks,  a  warrior  need  not 
be  ashamed  of  listening.  Did  not  Alaric  bid  us  spare  the  nuns  in 
Rome,  comrade  ?  And  though  I  am  no  Christian,  as  he  was,  I  thought 
it  no  shame  for  Odin’s  man  to  take  their  blessing  j  nor  will  I  to  take 
ihis  one’s,  Smid,  son  of  Troll.” 


CHAPTER  XIII. 


THE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  ABYSS. 

“  Here  am  I,  at  last  !  ”  said  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  to  himself. 
“Fairly  and  safely  landed  at  the  very  bottom  of  the  bottomless  : 
disporting  myself  on  the  firm  floor  of  the  primeval  nothing,  and 
finding  my  new  element,  like  boys  when  they  begin  to  swim,  not  so 
impracticable  after  all.  No  man,  angel,  or  demon  can  this  day  cast 
it  in  my  teeth  that  I  am  weak  enough  to  believe  or  disbelieve  any 
phenomenon  or  theory  in  or  concerning  heaven  or  earth  ;  or  even  that 
any  such  heaven,  earth,  phenomena,  or  theories  exist, — or  otherwise. 
...  .1  trust  that  is  a  sufficiently  exhaustive  statement  of  my  opinions? 
...  .1  am  certainly  not  dogmatic  enough  to  deny — or  to  assert  either 
— that  there  are  sensations.  .  .  .far  too  numerous  for  comfort. . .  .but 
as  for  proceeding  any  further,  by  induction,  deduction,  analysis,  or 
synthesis,  I  utterly  decline  the  office  of  Arachne,  and  will  spin  no 
more  cobwebs  out  of  my  own  inside, — if  I  have  any.  Sensations  ? 
What  are  they,  but  parts  of  one’s  self, — if  one  has  a  self  ?  What 
put  this  child’s  fancy  into  one’s  head,  that  there  is  anything  outside 
of  one  which  produces  them  ?  You  have  exactly  similar  ones  in  yonr 
dreams,  and  you  know  that  there  is  no  reality  corresponding  to  them. 
— No,  you  don’t  !  How  dare  you  be  dogmatic  enough  to  affirm  that? 
Why  should  not  your  dreams  be  as  real  as  your  waking  thoughts  ? 
Why  should  not  your  dreams  be  the  reality,  and  your  waking 
thoughts  the  dream  ?  What  matter  which  ? 

“What  matter,  indeed?  Here  have  I  been  staring  for  years — 
unless  that,  too,  is  a  dream,  which  it  very  probably  is — at  every 
mountebank  “ism”  which  ever  tumbled  and  capered  on  the  philo¬ 
sophic  tight- rope  ;  and  they  are  every  one  of  them  dead  dolls,  wooden, 
worked  with  wiiPes,  which  are  petitiones  principii . Each  philoso¬ 

pher  begs  the  question  in  hand,  and  then  marches  forward,  as  brave 
as  a  triumph,  and  prides  himself— on  proving  it  all  afterwards.  No 
wonder  that  his  theory  fits  the  universe,  when  he  has  first  clipped 
the  universe  to  fit  his  theory.  Have  I  not  tried  my  hand  at  many  a 
one, — starting,  too,  no  one  can  deny,  with  the  very  minimum  of 
clipping ....  for  I  suppose  one  cannot  begin  lower  than  at  simple  ‘  1 
am  I’. . .  .unless — which  is  equally  demonstrable — at  ‘  I  am  not  I.’  I 
recollect — or  dream — that  I  offered  that  sweet  dream,  Hypatia,  to 
deduce  all  things  in  heaven  and  earth,  from  the  Astronomies  of  Hip¬ 
parchus  to  the  number  of  plumes  in  an  archangel’s  wing,  from  that 

(142) 


THE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  ABYSS. 


14e 

one  simple  proposition,  if  slie  would  bnt  write  me  out  a  demonstra¬ 
tion  of  it  first,  as  some  sort  of  7tov  6t(S  for  the  apex  of  my  inverted 
pyramid.  But  she  disdained. . .  .people  are  apt  to  disdain  what  they 
know  they  cannot  do. . . .  ‘It  was  an  axiom,’  it  was  ‘ like  one  and  one 
making  two.’.  .  .  .How  cross  the  sweet  dream  was,  at  my  telling  her 
that  1  did  not  consider  that  any  axiom  either,  and  that  one  thing  and 
one  thing  seeming  to  us  to  be  two  things,  was  no  more  proof  that  they 
really  were  two,  and  not  three  hundred  and  sixty- five,  than  a  man’s 
seeming  to  be  an  honest  man  proved  him  not  to  be  a  rogue  ;  and  at 
my  asking  her,  moreover,  when  she  appealed  to  universal  experi¬ 
ence,  how  she  proved  that  the  combined  folly  of  all  fools  resulted  in 
wisdom  ! 

“  ‘  I  am  I  ’  an  axiom,  indeed  !  What  right  have  I  to  say  that  I  am 
not  any  one  else  ?  How  do  I  know  it  ?  How  do  I  know  that  there  is 
no  one  else  for  me  not  to  be  ?  I,  or  rather  something,  feels  a  number 
of  sensations,  longings,  thoughts,  fancies, — the  great  Devil  take 
them  all, — fresh  ones  every  moment,  and  each  at  war  tooth  and  nail 
with  all  the  rest  ;  and  then  on  the  strength  of  this  infinite  multiplic¬ 
ity  and  contradiction,  of  which  alone  I  am  aware,  I  am  to  be  illogical 
enough  to  stand  up  and  say,  ‘  I  by  myself  I  ’ ;  and  swear  stoutly  that 
I  am  one  thing,  when  all  I  am  conscious  of  is  the  Devil  only  knows 
how  many  things.  Of  all  quaint  deductions  from  experience,  that  is 
the  quaintest !  Would  it  not  be  more  philosophical  to  conclude  that 
I,  who  never  saw  or  felt  or  heard  this  which  I  call  myself,  am  what 
I  have  seen,  heard,  and  felt, — and  no  more  and  no  less, — that  sensa¬ 
tion  which  I  call  that  horse,  that  dead  man,  that  jackass,  those  forty 
thousand  two-legged  jackasses  who  appear  to  be  running  for  their 
lives  below  there,  having  got  hold  of  this  same  notion  of  their  being 
one  thing  each — as  I  choose  to  fancy  in  my  foolish  habit  of  imputing 
to  them  the  same  disease  of  thought  which  I  find  in  myself, — 
crucify  the  word  !  The  folly  of  my  ancestors — if  I  ever  had  any — 

prevents  my  having  any  better  expression . Why  should  I  not  be 

aj  I  feel, — that  sky,  those  clouds, — the  whole  universe  ?  Hercules  ! 
w  liat  a  creative  genius  my  sensorium  must  be  !  I’ll  take  to  writing 
poetry, — a  mock-epic,  in  seventy-two  books,  entitled,  ‘  The  Universe  ; 
ov,  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  ;  ’  and  take  Homer’s  Margites  for  my  model. 
Homer’s  ?  Mine  !  Why  must  not  the  Margites,  like  everything 
else,  have  been  a  sensation  of  my  own  ?  Hypatia  used  to  say 
Homer’s  poetry  was  a  part  of  her. . .  .only  she  could  not  prove  it. . . . 
but  I  have  proved. that  the  Margites  is  a  part  of  me. . .  .not  that  I  be¬ 
lieve  my  own  proof, — skepticism  forbid!  O  would  to  heaven  that  the 
said  whole  disagreeable  universe  were  annihilated,  if  it  were  only 
just  to  settle  by  fair  experiment  whether  any  of  master  ‘I’  remained 
when  they  were  gone  !  Buzzard  and  dogmatist  I  And  how  do  you 
know  that  that  would  settle  it  1  And  if  it  did — why  need  it  be 
settled? _ 

“  I  dare  say  there  is  an  answer  pat  for  all  this.  I  could  write  a 


144 


HYPATIA. 


pretty  one  myself  in  half  an  hour.  But  then  I  should  not  believe 
it. .  .  .nor  the  rejoinder  to  that.  .  .  .nor  the  demurrer  to  that  again.  . .  . 
So.  . .  .1  am  both  sleepy  and  hungry. . .  .or  rather,  sleepiness  and 
hunger  are  me.  Which  is  it  ?  Heigh-ho. ...”  and  Raphael  finished 
his  meditation  by  a  mighty  yawn. 

This  hopeful  oration  was  delivered  in  a  fitting  lecture-room.  Be¬ 
tween  the  bare  walls  of  a  doleful  fire-scarred  tower  in  the  Campagna 
of  Rome,  standing  upon  a  knoll  of  dry  brown  grass,  ringed  with  a 
few  grim  pines,  blasted  and  black  with  smoke,  there  sat  Raphael 
Aben-Ezra,  working  out  the  last  formula  of  the  great  world-problem, 
— “  Given  Self,  to  find  God.”  Through  the  doorless  stone  archway 
he  could  see  a  long  vista  of  the  plain  below,  covered  with  broken 
trees,  trampled  crops,  smoking  villas,  and  all  the  ugly  scars  of  re¬ 
cent  war,  far  onward  to  the  quiet  purple  mountains  and  the  silver 
sea,  toward  which  struggled,  far  in  the  distance,  long  dark  lines  of 
moving  specks,  flowing  together,  breaking  up,  stopping  short,  re¬ 
coiling  back  to  surge  forward  by  some  fresh  channel,  while  now  and 
then  a  glitter  of  keen  white  sparks  ran  through  the  dense  black 

masses . The  Count  of  Africa  had  thrown  for  the  empire  of  the 

world — and  lost. 

“  Brave  old  Sun  !  ”  said  Raphael,  “  how  merrily  he  flashes  off  the 
sword- blades  yonder,  and  never  cares  that  every  tiny  sparkle  brings 
a  death-shriek  after  it  !  Why  should  he  ?  It  is  no  concern  of  his. 
Astrologers  are  fools.  His  business  is  to  shine  ;  and  on  the  whole, 
he  is  one  of  my  few  satisfactory  sensations.  How  now  ?  This  is 
questionably  pleasant  !  ” 

As  he  spoke,  a  column  of  troops  came  marching  across  the  field, 
straight  toward  his  retreat. 

‘‘  If  these  new  sensations  of  mine  find  me  here,  they  will  infallibly 
produce  in  me  a  new  sensation,  which  will  render  all  further  ones 
impossible. . . .  Well  ?  What  kinder  thing  could  they  do  for  me  ?. . . . 
Ay — but  how  do  I  know  that  they  would  do  it  ?  What  possible  proof 
is  there  that,  if  a  two-legged  phantasm  pokes  a  hard  iron-gray 
phantasm  in  among  my  sensations,  those  sensations  will  be  my  last  ? 
Is  the  fact  of  my  turning  pale,  and  lying  still,  and  being  in  a  day  or 
two  converted  into  crow’s  flesh,  any  reason  why  I  should  not  feel  ? 
And  how  do  I  know  that  would  happen  ?  I  see  it  happen  to  certain 
sensations  of  my  eyeball, — or  something  else, — who  cares  ?  which  I 
call  soldiers  ;  but  what  possible  analogy  can  there  be  between  what 
seems  to  happen  to  those  single  sensations  called  soldiers,  and  what 
may  or  may  not  really  happen  to  all  my  sensations  put  together, 
which  I  call  me.  Should  I  bear  apples  if  a  phantasm  seemed  to 
come  and  plant  me  ?  Then  why  should  I  die  if  another  phantasm 
seemed  to  come  and  poke  me  in  the  ribs  ? 

“  Still,  I  don’t  intend  to  deny  it. . .  .1  am  no  dogmatist.  Positively 
the  phantasms  are  marching  straight  for  my  tower.  Well,  it  may  be 
safer  to  run  away,  on  the  chance.  But  as  for  losing  feeling,”  con- 


THE  BOTTOM  OP  THE  ABt88. 


145 


tinned  lie,  rising,  and  cramming  a  few  moldy  crusts  into  liis  wallet, 
‘'that,  like  everything  else,  is  past  proof.  Why — if  now,  when  I 
have  some  sort  of  excuse  for  fancying  myself  one  thing  in  one  place, 
I  am  driven  mad  with  the  number  of  my  sensations,  what  will  it  be 
when  I  am  eaten,  and  turned  to  dust,  and  undeniably  many  things  in 
many  places?. . .  .Will  not  the  sensations  be  multiplied  by — unbear¬ 
able  !  I  would  swear  at  the  thought,  if  I  had  anything  to  swear  by  ! 
To  be  transmuted  into  the  sensoria  of  forty  different  nasty  carrion 
crows,  besides  two  or  three  foxes,  and  a  large  black-beetle  !  I’ll  run 
away,  just  like  anybody  else. . .  .if  anybody  existed.  Come,  Bran  !  ” 

*  *  -Sfr  *  * 

“Bran  !  where  are  you;  unlucky  inseparable  sensation  of  mine? 
Pick  ng  up  a  dinner  already  off  these  dead  soldiers  ?  Well,  the  pity 
is  that  this  foolish  contradictory  taste  of  mine,  while  it  makes  me 
hungry,  forbids  me  to  follow  your  example.  Why  am  I  to  take 
lessons  from  my  soldier-phantasms,  and  not  from  my  canine  one  ? 
Illogical  !  Bran  !  Bran  !  ”  and  he  went  out  and  whistled  in  vain  for 
the  dog. 

“Bran  !  unhappy  phantom,  who  will  not  vanish  by  night  or  day, 
lying  on  my  chest  even  in  dreams  ;  and  who  would  not  even  let  me 
vanish,  and  solve  the  problem, — though  I  don’t  believe  there  is  any, 
— why  did  you  drag  me  out  of  the  sea  there  at  Ostia  ?  Why  did  you 
not  let  me  become  a  whole  shoal  of  crabs  ?  How  did  you  know,  or  I 
either,  that  they  may  not  be  very  jolly  fellows,  and  not  in  the  least 
troubled  with  philosophic  doubts?.  ..  .But  perhaps  there  were  no 
crabs,  but  only  phantasms  of  crabs.  . .  .And,  on  the  other  hand,  if  the 
crab- phantasms  give  jolly  sensations,  why  should  not  the  crow-phan¬ 
tasms?  So,  whichever  way  it  turns  out,  no  matter  ;  and  I  may  as 
well  wait  here,  and  seem  to  become  crows,  as  I  certainly  shall  do. — 
Bran  !.  . .  .Why  should  I  wait  for  her?  What  pleasure  can  it  be  to 
me  to  have  the  feeling  of  a  four-legged,  brindled,  lop-eared,  toad¬ 
mouthed  thing  always  between  what  seem  to  be  my  legs  ?  There  she 
is  !  Where  have  you  been,  madam  ?  Don’t  you  see  I  am  in  march¬ 
ing  order  with  staff  and  wallet  ready  shouldered  ?  Come  !  ” 

But  the  dog,  looking  up  in  his  face  as  only  dogs  can  look,  ran 
toward  the  back  of  the  ruin,  and  up  to  him  again,  and  back  again, 
until  he  followed  her. 

“What’s  this?  Here  is  a  new  sensation  with  a  vengeance!  O 
storm  and  crowd  of  material  appearances,  were  there  not  enough  of 
you  already,  that  you  must  add  to  your  number  these  also  ?  Bran  1 
Bran  1  Could  you  find  no  other  day  in  the  year  but  this,  whereon  to 
present  my  ears  with  the  squeals  of — one — two — three — nine  blind 
puppies  ?  ” 

Bran  answered  by  rushing  into  the  hole  where  her  new  family  lay 
tumbling  and  squealing,  bringing  out  one  in  her  mouth,  and  laying  it 
at  his  feet. 

“  Needless,  I  assure  you.  I  am  perfectly  aware  of  the  state  of  the 


146 


HYPATIA. 


case  already.  What  !  another  ?  Silly  old  thing  ! — do  you  fancy,  as 
the  fine  ladies  do,  that  burdening  tlie  world  with  noisy  likenesses  of 
your  precious  self  is  a  thing  of  wliicli  to  be  proud  ?  Why,  she's  bring¬ 
ing  out  the  whole  litter  ,  .What  was  I  thinking  of  last?  Ah — 
the  argument  was  self-contradictory,  was  it,  because  I  could  not  argue 
without  using  the  very  terms  which  I  repudiated.  Well. . .  .And, — 
why  should  it  not  be  contradictory  ?  Why  not  ?  One  must  face  that 
too,  after  all.  Why  should  not  a  thing  be  true,  and  false  also  ?  What 
harm  in  a  thing’s  being  false  ?  What  necessity  for  it  to  be  true  ? 
True  ?  What  is  truth  ?  Why  should  a  thing  be  the  worse  for  being 
illogical  ?  Why  should  there  be  any  logic  at  all  ?  Did  I  ever  see  a 
little  beast  flying  about  with  ‘  Logic’  labeled  on  its  back  ?  What  do  I 
know  of  it,  but  as  a  sensation  of  my  own  mind, — if  I  have  any  ?  What 
proof  is  that  that  I  am  to  obey  it,  and  not  it  me  ?  If  a  flea  bites  me, 
I  get  rid  of  that  sensation  ;  and  if  logic  bothers  me.  I’ll  get  rid  of  that 
too.  Phantasms  must  be  taught  to  vanish  courteously.  One’s  only 
hope  of  comfort  lies  in  kicking  feebly  against  the  tyranny  of  one’s  own 
boring  notions  and  sensations, — every  philosopher  confesses  that, — 
and  what  god  is  logic,  pray,  that  it  is  to  be  the  sole  exception?,  .  .  . 
What,  old  lady  ?  I  give  you  fair  warning,  you  must  choose  this  day, 
like  any  nun,  between  the  ties  of  family  and  those  of  duty.” 

Bran  seized  him  by  the  skirt,  and  pulled  him  down  toward  the 
puppies  ;  took  up  one  of  the  puppies  and  lifted  it  toward  him  ;  and 
then  repeated  the  action  with  another, 

“  You  unconscionable  old  brute  ;  you  don’t  actually  dare  to  expect 
me  to  carry  your  puppies  for  you  ?  ”  and  he  turned  to  go. 

Bran  sat  down  on  her  tail,  and  began  howling. 

“  Farewell,  old  dog  !  you  have  been  a  pleasant  dream  after  all . 

But  if  you  will  go  the  way  of  all  phantasms  ”....  And  he  walked 
away. 

Bran  ran  with  him,  leaping  and  barking  ;  then  recollected  her  family 
and  ran  back  ;  tried  to  bring  them  one  by  one  in  her  mouth,  and  then 
to  bring  them  all  at  once  ;  and  failing,  sat  down  and  howled. 

“  Come,  Bran  !  Come,  old  girl  I” 

She  raced  half-way  up  to  him  ;  then  half-way  back  again  to  the 
puppies  ;  then  toward  him  again  ;  and  then  suddenly  gave  it  up,  and, 
dropping  her  tail,  walked  slowly  back  to  the  blind  suppliants,  with 
a  deep,  reproachful  growl. 

<<*****  I  ”  Raphael,  with  a  mighty  oath  ;  ‘'you  are  right 
after  all  !  Here  are  nine  things  come  into  the  world  :  phantasms  or 
not,  there  it  is  ;  1  can’t  deny  it.  They  are  something,  and  you  are 
something,  old  dog  ;  or  at  least  like  enough  to  something  to  do  in¬ 
stead  of  it  ;  and  you  are  not  1,  and  as  good  as  I,  and  they  too,  for 
aught  I  know,  and  have  as  good  a  right  to  live  as  I ;  and  by  the  seven 
planets  and  all  the  rest  of  it.  I’ll  carry  them  !  ” 

And  he  went  back,  tied  up  the  puppies  in  his  blanket,  and  set  forth. 
Bran  barking,  squeaking,  wagging,  leaping,  running  between  his  legs 
and  upsetting  him,  in  her  agonies  of  joy. 


THE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  AB7SS.  W 

“Forward!  Wliitlier  you  will,  old  lady!  The  world  is  wide. 
You  shall  he  my  guide,  tutor,  queen  of  philosophy,  for  the  sake  of 
this  mere  common  sense  of  yours.  Forward,  you  new  Hypatia  I  I 
promise  you  I  will  attend  no  lectures  hut  yours  this  day  !  ” 

He  toiled  on,  every  now  and  then  stepping  across  a  dead  hody,  or 
clambering  a  wall  out  of  the  road,  to  avoid  some  plunging,  shrieking 
horse,  or  obscene  knot  of  prowling  camp-followers,  who  were  already 

stripping  and  plundering  the  slain . At  last,  in  front  of  a  large 

villa,  now  a  black  and  smoking  skeleton,  he  leaped  the  wall  and 

found  himself  landed  on  a  heap  of  corpses . They  were  piled  up 

against  the  garden  fence  for  many  yards.  The  struggle  had  been 
fierce  there  some  three  hours  before. 

“  Put  me  out  of  my  misery  !  In  mercy  kill  me  !  ”  moaned  a  voice 
beneath  his  feet, 

Raphael  looked  down  ;  the  poor  wretch  was  slashed  and  mutilated 
beyond  all  hope, 

“Certainly,  friend,  if  you  wish  it,”  and  he  drew  his  dagger.  The 
poor  fellow  stretched  out  his  throat,  and  awaited  the  stroke  with  a 
ghastly  smile.  Raphael  caught  his  eye  ;  his  heart  failed  him,  and  he 
rose. 

“What  do  you  advise.  Bran?”  But  the  dog  was  far  ahead,  leap¬ 
ing  and  barking  impatiently, 

“I  obey,”  said  Raphael  ;  and  he  followed  her,  while  the  wounded 
man  called  piteously  and  upbraidingly  after  him, 

“  He  will  not  have  long  to  wait.  Those  plunderers  will  not  be  as 

squeamish  as  I . Strange,  now  !  From  Armenian  reminiscences  I 

should  have  fancied  myself  as  free  from  such  tender  weakness  as  any 

of  my  Canaanite-slaying  ancestors . And  yet,  by  some  mere  spirit 

of  contradiction,  I  couldn’t  kill  that  fellow,  exactly  because  he  asked 
me  to  do  it . There  is  more  in  that  than  will  fit  into  the  great  in¬ 

verted  pyramid  of  ‘I  am  I.’  . . . .  Never  mind,  let  me  get  the  dog’s 
lessons  by  heart  first.  What  next.  Bran?  Ah?  could  one  believe 
the  transformation  ?  Why,  this  is  the  very  trim  villa  which  I  passed 
yesterday  morning,  with  the  garden  chairs  standing  among  the  flower¬ 
beds,  just  as  the  young  ladies  had  left  them,  and  the  peacocks  and 
silver  pheasants  running  about,  wondering  why  their  pretty  mistresses 
did  not  come  to  feed  them.  And  here  is  a  trampled  mass  of  wreck  and 
corruption  for  the  girls  to  find,  when  they  venture  back  from  Rome, 
and  complain  how  horrible  war  is  for  breaking  down  all  their  shrubs, 
and  how  cruel  soldiers  must  be  to  kill  and  cook  all  their  poor  dear 
tame  turtle-doves  !  Why  not  ?  Why  should  they  lament  over  other 
things,' — which  they  can  just  as  little  mend, — and  which,  perhaps, 
need  no  more  mending?  Ah  1  there  lies  a  gallant  fellow  underneath 
that  fruit-tree  !  ” 

Raphael  walked  up  to  a  ring  of  dead,  in  the  midst  of  which  lay, 
half  sitting  against  the  trunk  of  the  tr’ee,  a  tall  and  noble  officer,  in 
the  first  bloom  of  manhood.  His  casque  and  armor,  gorgeously  inlaid 


148 


HYPATIA. 


with  gold,  were  hewn  and  battered  by  a  hundred  blows  ;  his  shield 
was  cloven  through  and  through  ;  his  sword  broken  in  the  stiffened 
hand  which  grasped  it  still.  Cut  off  from  his  troop,  he  had  made 
his  last  stand  beneath  the  tree,  knee-deep  in  the  gay  summer  flowers, 
and  there  he  lay,  bestrewn,  as  if  by  some  mockery — or  pity — of 
mother  Nature,  with  faded  roses,  and  golden  fruit,  shaken  from  off 
the  boughs  in  that  last  deadly  struggle.  Raphael  stood  and  watched 
him  with  a  sad  sneer. 

“  Well — you  have  sold  your  fancied  personality  dear  !  How  many 
dead  men  !. . .  .Nine. . .  .Eleven  !  Conceited  fellow  !  Who  told  you 
that  your  one  life  was  worth  the  eleven  which  you  have  taken  ?  ” 

Bran  went  up  to  the  corpse, — perhaps  from  its  sitting  posture  fan¬ 
cying  it  still  living, — smelled  the  cold  cheek,  and  recoiled  with  a 
mournful  whine. 

“Eh?  That  is  the  right  way  to  look  at  the  phenomenon,  is  it  ? 

Well,  after  all,  I  am  sorry  for  you . almost  like  you.  . .  .All  your 

wounds  in  front,  as  a  man’s  should  be.  Poor  fop  !  Lais  and  Thais 
will  never  curl  those  dainty  ringlets  for  you  again  !  What  is  that 
bas-relief  upon  your  shield?  Venus  receiving  Psyche  into  the  abode 
of  the  gods  ! . . . .  Ah  !  you  have  found  out  all  about  Psyche’s  wings  by 

this  time . How  do  I  know  that?  And  yet,  why  am  I,  in  spite  of 

my  common  sense, — if  I  have  any, — talking  to  you  as  you,  and  liking 
you,  and  pitying  you,  if  you  are  nothing  now,  and  probably  never 
were  anything?  Bran!  What  right  had  you  to  pity  him  without 
giving  your  reasons  in  due  form,  as  Hypatia  would  have  done  ?  For¬ 
give  me,  sir,  however,  whether  you  exist  or  not,  I  cannot  leave  that 
collar  round  your  neck  for  these  camp- wolves  to  convert  into  strong 
liquor.” 

And  as  he  spoke,  he  bent  down,  and  detached,  gently  enough,  a 
magnificent  necklace. 

“  Not  for  myself,  I  assure  you.  Like  Ate’s  golden  apple,  it  shall 
go  to  the  fairest.  Here,  Bran  1” 

And  he  wreathed  the  jewels  round  the  neck  of  the  mastiff,  who, 
evidently  exalted  in  her  own  eyes  by  the  burden,  leaped  and  barked 
forward,  again,  taking,  apparently  as  a  matter  of  course,  the  road 
back  to  Ostia,  by  which  they  had  come  thither  from  the  sea.  And 
as  he  followed,  careless  where  he  went,  he  continued  talking  to  him¬ 
self  aloud,  after  the  manner  of  restless,  self-discontented  men. 

. . . .“  And  then  man  talks  big  about  his  dignity  and  his  intellect, 
and  his  heavenly  parentage,  and  his  aspirations  after  the  unseen  and 
the  beautiful,  and  the  infinite, — and  everything  else  unlike  himself. 
How  can  he  prove  it  ?  Why,  these  poor  blackguards  lying  about  are 
very  fair  specimens  of  humanity.  And  how  much  have  they  been 
bothered  since  they  were  born  with  aspirations  after  anything  infi¬ 
nite,  except  infinite  sour  wine  ?  To  eat,  to  drink  ;  to  destroy  a  cer¬ 
tain  number  of  their  species  ;  to  reproduce  a  certain  number  of  the 
same,  two-thirds  of  whom  will  die  in  infancy,  a  dead  waste  of  pain 


140 


TRB  BOTTOM  OP  THE  ABYSS. 

to  tlieir  motliers,  and  of  expense  to  their  putative  sires . And  then 

- what  says  Solomon  ?  What  befalls  them  befalls  beasts.  As  one 

dies,  so  dies  the  other  ;  so  that  they  have  all  one  breath,  and  a  man 
has  no  pre-eminence  over  a  beast ;  for  all  is  vanity.  All  go  to  one 
place  ;  all  are  of  the  dust,  and  turn  to  dust  again.  Who  knows  that 
the  breath  of  man  goes  upward,  and  that  the  breath  of  the  beast  goes 
downward  to  the  earth?  Who,  indeed,  my  most  wise  ancestor! 
Not  I,  certainly.  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  how  art  thou  better  than  a 
beast  ?  What  pre-eminence  hast  thou,  not  merely  over  this  dog,  but 
over  the  fleas  whom  thoi;  so  wantonly  cursest  I  Man  must  painfully 

win  house,  clothes,  Are . A  pretty  proof  of  his  wisdom,  when  every 

flea  has  the  wit  to  make  my  blanket,  without  any  labor  of  his  own, 
lodge  him  a  great  deal  better  than  it  lodges  me  1  Man  makes  clothes, 
and  the  fleas  live  in  them . Which  is  the  wiser  of  the  two? 

“  Ah,  but — man  is  fallen . Well — and  the  flea  is  not.  So  much 

better  he  than  the  man  ;  for  he  is  what  he  was  intended  to  be,  and 
so  fulfills  the  very  definition  of  virtue.  . .  .which  no  one  can  say  of  us 
of  the  red -ocher  vein.  And  even  if  the  old  myth  be  true,  and  the 
man  only  fell,  because  he  was  set  to  do  higher  work  than  the  flea — 
what  does  that  prove — but  that  he  could  not  do  it? 

‘  ‘  But  his  arts  and  his  sciences  ? . . . .  Apage  I  The  very  sound  of 

those  grown  children’s  rattles  turns  me  sick . One  conceited  ass  in  a 

generation  increasing  labor  and  sorrow,  and  dying  after  all  even  as 
the  fool  dies,  and  ten  million  brutes  and  slaves,  just  where  their  fore¬ 
fathers  were,  and  where  their  children  will  be  after  them,  to  the  end 

of  the  farce . The  thing  that  has  been,  it  is  that  which  shall  be  ; 

and  there  is  no  new  thing  under  the  sun.  . . . 

“  And  as  for  your  palaces,  and  cities,  and  temples. . .  .look  at  this 
Campagna,  and  judge  I  Flea-bites  go  down  after  a  while — and  so 
do  they.  What  are  they  but  the  bumps  which  we  human  fleas  make 
in  the  old  earth’s  skin?.  ..  .Make  them?  We  only  cause  them,  as 

fleas  cause  flea-bites . What  are  all  the  works  of  man,  but  a  sort  of 

cutaneous  disorder  in  this  unhealthy  earth-hide,  and  we  a  race  of 
larger  fleas,  running  about  among  its  fur,  which  we  call  trees  ?  Why 
should  not  the  earth  be  an  animal  ?  How  do  I  know  it  is  not.  Be¬ 
cause  it  is  too  big?  Bah  1  What  is  big,  and  what  is  little  ?  Because 
it  has  not  the  shape  of  one?. .  .  .Look  into  a  fisherman’s  net,  and  see 
what  forms  are  there  1  Because  it  does  not  speak  ?,..  .Perhaps  it 
has  nothing  to  say,  being  too  busy.  Perhaps  it  can  talk  no  more  sense 

than  we . In  both  cases  it  shows  its  wisdom  by  holding  its  tongue. 

Because  it  moves  in  one  necessary  direction  ?.  .  .  .How  do  I  know  that 
it  does  ?  How  can  I  tell  that  it  is  not  flirting  with  all  the  seven  spheres 
at  once,  at  this  moment  ?  But  if  it  does — so  much  the  wiser  of  it,  if 
that  be  the  best  direction  for  it.  O  what  a  base  satire  on  ourselves 
and  our  notions  of  the  fair  and  fitting,  to  say  that  a  thing  cannot  be 
alive  and  rational,  just  because  it  goes  steadily  on  upon  its  own  road, 
instead  of  skipping  and  scrambling  fantastically  up  and  down  without 


150 


MYPATiA. 


method  or  order,  like  us  and  the  fleas,  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave  ! 
Besides,  if  you  grant,  with  the  rest  of  the  world,  that  fleas  are  less 
noble  than  we,  because  they  are  our  parasites,  then  you  are  bound  to 
grant  that  we  are  less  noble  than  the  earth,  because  we  are  its  para¬ 
sites.  . . .  Positively,  it  looks  more  probable  than  anything  I  have 

seen  for  many  a  day . And,  by  the  by,  why  should  not  earthquakes, 

and  floods,  and  pestilences,  be  only  just  so  many  ways  which  the 
cunning  old  brute  Earth  has  of  scratching  herself,  when  the  human 
fleas  and  their  palace  and  city  bites  get  too  troublesome  ?  ” 

At  a  turn  of  the  road  he  was  aroused  from  his  profitable  meditation 
a  shriek,  the  shrillness  of  which  told  him  that  it  was  a  woman’s. 
He  looked  up,  and  saw  close  to  him,  among  the  smoldering  ruins  of 
a  farm-house,  two  ruffians,  driving  before  them  a  young  girl,  with 
her  hands  tied  behind  her,  while  the  poor  creature  was  looking  back 
piteously  after  something  among  the  ruins,  and  struggling  in  vain, 
bound  as  she  was,  to  escape  from  her  captors,  and  return. 

“  Conduct  unjustifiable  in  any  fleas, — eh.  Bran?  How  do  I  know 
that,  though  ?  Why  should  it  not  be  a  piece  of  excellent  fortune  for 
her,  if  she  had  but  the  equanimity  to  see  it?  Why,  what  will 

happen  to  her  ?  She  will  be  taken  to  Borne,  and  sold  as  a  slave . 

And  in  spite  of  a  few  discomforts  in  the  transfer,  and  the  prejudice 
which  some  persons  have  against  standing  an  hour  on  the  catasta  to 
be  handled  from  head  to  foot  in  the  minimum  of  clothing,  she  will 
most  probably  end  in  being  far  better  housed,  fed,  bedizened,  and 
pampered  to  her  heart’s  desire,  than  ninety-nine  out  of  a  hundred  of 
her  sister  fleas. .  .  .till  she  begins  to  grow  old. . .  .which  she  must  do 

in  any  case . And  if  she  have  not  contrived  to  wheedle  her  master 

out  of  her  liberty,  and  to  make  up  a  pretty  little  purse  of  savings,  by 
that  time, — why,  it  is  her  own  fault.  Eh,  Bran  ?  ” 

But  Bran  by  no  means  agreed  with  his  view  of  the  case  ;  for,  after 
watching  the  two  ruffians,  with  her  head  stuck  on  one  side,  for  a 
minute  or  two,  she  suddenly  and  silently,  after  the  manner  of  mas¬ 
tiffs,  sprung  upon  them,  and  dragged  one  to  the  ground. 

‘  ‘  0,  that  is  the  ‘  fit  and  beautiful,’  in  this  case,  as  they  say  in 
Alexandria,  is  it  ?  Well,  I  obey.  You  are  at  least  a  more  practical 
teacher  than  ever  Hypatia  was.  Heaven  grant  that  there  may  be  no 
more  of  them  in  the  ruins  !  ” 

And,  rushing  on  the  second  plunderer,  he  laid  him  dead  with  a 
blow  of  his  dagger,  and  then  turned  to  the  first,  whom  Bran  was 
holding  down  by  the  throat. 

“  Mercy,  mercy  !”  shrieked  the.  wretch.  “  Life  !  only  life  !  ” 
There  was  a  fellow  half  a  mile  back  begging  me  to  kill  him  : 
with  which  of  you  two  am  I  to  agree  ? — for  you  can’t  both  be  right.” 
“Life!  Only  life  1” 

“A  carnal  appetite,  which  man  must  learn  t:)  conquer,”  said 

Kaphael,  as  he  raised  the  poniard . In  a  moment  it  was  over,  and 

Bran  and  he  rose. — Where  was  the  girl  ?  She  had  rushed  back  to 


The  bottom  oe  the  abyss. 


151 


tlie  ruins,  wliitlier  Raphael  followed  her  ;  while  Bran  ran  to  the 
puppies,  which  he  had  laid  upon  a  stone,  and  commenced  her  ma¬ 
ternal  cares. 

“  What  do  you  want,  my  poor  girl  asked  he  in  Latin.  “  I  will 
not  hurt  you.” 

“  My  father  !  My  father  !  ” 

He  untied  her  bruised  and  swollen  wrists  ;  and,  without  stopping 
to  thank  him,  she  ran  to  a  heap  of  fallen  stones  and  beams,  and  be¬ 
gan  digging  wildly  with  all  her  little  strength,  breathlessly  calling, 
“Father!” 

“  Such  is  the  gratitude  of  flea  to  flea  !  What  is  there,  now,  in  the 
mere  fact  of  being  accustomed  to  call  another  person  father,  and  not 
master,  or  slave,  which  should  produce  such  passion  as  that  ?.  . .  . 
Brute  habit  I.  .  .  .What  services  can  the  said  man  render,  or  have  ren¬ 
dered,  which  make  him  worth - Here  is  Bran  I. . .  .What  do  you 

think  of  that,  my  female  philosopher  ” 

Bran  sat  down  and  watched  too.  The  poor  girl’s  tender  hands 
were  bleeding  from  the  stones,  while  her  golden  tresses  rolled  down 
over  her  eyes,  and  entangled  in  her  impatient  Angers  ;  but  still  she 
worked  frantically.  Bran  seemed  suddenly  to  comprehend  the  case, 
rushed  to  the  rescue,  and  began  digging  too,  with  all  her  might. 

Raphael  rose  with  a  shrug,  and  joined  in  the  work. 

*  *  *  *  * 

“Hang  these  brute  instincts!  They  make  one  very  hot.  What 
was  that  ?  ” 

A  feeble  moan  rose  from  under  the  stones.  A  human  limb  was 
uncovered.  The  girl  threw  herself  on  the  place,  shrieking  her 
father’s  name.  Raphael  pat  her  gently  back,  and,  exerting  his  whole 
strength,  drew  out  of  the  ruins  a  stalwart  elderly  man,  in  the  dresS 
of  an  offlcer  of  high  rank. 

He  still  breathed.  The  girl  lifted  up  his  head  and  covered  him 
with  wild  kisses.  Raphael  looked  round  for  water  ;  found  a  spring 
and  a  broken  sherd,  and  bathed  the  wounded  man’s  temples  till  he 
opened  his  eyes  and  showed  signs  of  returning  life. 

The  girl  still  sat  by  him,  fondling  her  recovered  treasure,  and 
bathing  the  grizzled  face  in  holy  tears. 

“  It  is  no  business  of  mine,”  said  Raphael.  “  Come,  Bran  !  ” 

The  girl  sprung  up,  threw  herself  at  his  feet,  kissed  his  hands, 
called  him  her  saviour,  her  deliverer,  sent  by  God. 

“  Not  in  the  least,  my  child.  You  must  thank  my  teacher,  the  dog, 
not  me.” 

And  she  took  him  at  his  word,  and  threw  her  soft  arms  round 
Bran’s  neck  ;  and  Bran  understood  it,  and  wagged  her  tail,  and  licked 
the  gentle  face  lovingly. 

“  Intolerably  absurd,  all  this  !  ”  said  Raphael.  “  I  must  be  going. 
Bran.” 

“You  will  not  leave  us.  You  surely  will  not  leave  an  old  man  to 
die  here  ?  ” 


15B 


BTPATIA. 


“  Why  not?  What  better  thing  could  happen  to  him  ?** 

“Jslothing/’  murmured  the  officer,  who  had  not  spoken  before. 

Ah  God  !  he  is  my  father  1  ” 

‘‘Well?” 

‘  ‘  He  is  my  father  !  ” 

“Well?” 

“You  must  save  him!  You  shall,  I  say!”  And  she  seized 
Raphael’s  arm  in  the  imperiousness  of  her  passion. 

He  shrugged  his  shoulders  ;  but  felt,  he  knew  not  why,  marvel¬ 
ously  inclined  to  obey  her. 

‘  ‘  I  may  as  well  do  this  as  anything  else,  having  nothing  else  to  do. 
Whither  now,  sir?” 

“Whither  you  will.  Our  troops  are  disgraced,  oui  eagles  taken. 
We  are  your  prisoners  by  right  of  war.  We  follow  you,” 

“  O  my  fortune  !  A  new  responsibility  !  Why  cannot  I  stir  with¬ 
out  live  animals,  from  fleas  upward,  attaching  themselves  to  me  ?  Is 
it  not  enough  to  have  nine  blind  puppies  at  my  back,  and  an  old  brute 
at  my  heels,  who  will  persist  in  saving  my  life,  that  I  must  be  bur¬ 
dened  over  and  above  with  a  respectable  elderly  rebel  and  his  daugh¬ 
ter?  Why  am  I  not  allowed  by  fate  to  care  for  nobody  but  myself? 
Sir,  I  give  you  both  your  freedom.  The  world  is  wide  enough  for  us 
all.  I  really  ask  no  ransom.” 

“You  seem  philosophically  disposed,  my  friend.” 

“I?  Heaven  forbid  !  I  have  gone  right  through  that  slough,  and 
come  out  sheer  on  the  other  side.  For  sweeping  the  last  lingering 
taint  out  of  me,  I  have  to  thank,  not  sulphur  and  exorcisms,  but  your 
soldiers  and  their  morning’s  work.  Philosophy  is  superfluous  in  a 
world  where  all  are  fools.” 

“Do  you  include  yourself  under  that  title?” 

“  Most  certainly,  my  best  sir.  Don’t  fancy  that  I  make  any  excep¬ 
tions.  If  I  can  in  any  way  prove  my  folly  to  you,  I  will  do  it.” 

‘‘  Then  help  me  and  my  daughter  to  Ostia.” 

“  A  very  fair  instance.  Well, — my  dog  happens  to  be  going  that 
way ;  and,  after  all,  you  seem  to  have  a  sufficient  share  of  human 
imbecility  to  be  a  very  fit  companion  for  me.  I  hope,  though,  you 
do  not  set  up  for  a  wise  man  ?  ” 

“  God  knows — no  !  Am  I  not  of  Heraclian’s  army?  ” 

“True;  and  the  young  lady,  here,  made  herself  so  great  a  fool 
about  you  that  she  actually  infected  the  very  dog.” 

“  So  we  three  fools  will  go  forth  together.” 

“  And  the  greatest  one,  as  usual,  must  help  the  rest.  But  I  have 
nine  puppies  in  my  family  already.  How  am  I  to  carry  you  and 
them  ?  ” 

“I  will  take  them,”  said  the  girl  ;  and  Bran,  after  looking  on  at 
the  transfer  with  a  somewhat  dubious  face,  seemed  to  satisfy  lierself 
that  all  was  right,  and  put  her  head  contentedly  under  the  girl’s  hand. 

“Eh?  You  trust  her.  Bran  ?”  said  Raphael,  in  an  undertone.  “  I 


TEE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  ABYSS. 


153 


must  really  emancipate  myself  from  your  instructions  if  you  require 
a  similar  simplicity  in  me.  Stay  !  tliere  wanders  a  mule  without  a 
rider  ;  we  may  as  well  press  him  into  the  service.” 

He  caught  the  mule,  lifted  the  wounded  man  into  the  saddle,  and 
the  cavalcade  set  forth,  turning  out  of  the  high-road  into  a  by-lane, 
which  the  officer,  who  seemed  to  know  the  country  thoroughly,  assured 
him  would  lead  them  to  Ostia  by  an  unfrequented  route. 

“  If  we  arrive  there  before  sundown,  we  are  saved,”  said  he. 

“And  in  the  mean  time,”  answered  Raphael,  “  between  the  dog 
and  this  dagger,  which,  as  I  take  care  to  inform  all  comers,  is  deli¬ 
cately  poisoned,  we  may  keep  ourselves  clear  of  marauders.  And  yet 
what  a  meddling  fool  I  am  !  ”  he  went  on  to  himself.  “  What  possi¬ 
ble  interest  can  1  have  in  this  uncircumcised  rebel  ?  The  least  evil  is, 
that  if  we  are  taken,  which  we  most  probably  shall  be,  I  shall  be 
crucified  for  helping  him  to  escape.  But  even  if  we  get  safe  off, — 
here  is  a  fresh  tie  between  me  and  those  very  brother  fieas,  to  be  rid 
of  whom  I  have  chosen  beggary  and  starvation.  Who  knows  where 
it  may  end  ?  Pooh  !  The  man  is  like  other  men.  He  is  certain,  be¬ 
fore  the  day  is  over,  to  prove  ungrateful,  or  attempt  the  mountebank- 
heroic,  or  give  me  some  other  excuse  for  bidding  him  good  even¬ 
ing.  And  in  the  mean  time,  there  is  something  quaint  in  the  fact  of 
finding  so  sober  a  respectability,  with  a  young  daughter  too,  abroad 
on  this  fool’s  errand,  which  really  makes  me  curious  to  discover  with 
what  variety  of  flea  I  am  to  class  him.” 

But  while  Aben-Ezra  was  talking  to  himself  about  the  father,  he 
could  not  help,  somehow,  thinking  about  the  daughter.  Again  and 
again  he  found  himself  looking  at  her.  She  was,  undeniably,  most 
beautiful.  Her  features  were  not  as  regularly  perfect  as  Hypatia’s, 
nor  her  stature  so  commanding  ;  but  her  face  shone  with  a  clear  and 
joyful  determination,  and  with  a  tender  and  modest  thoughtfulness, 
such  as  he  had  never  beheld  before  united  in  one  countenance  ;  and 
as  she  stepped  along,  firmly  and  lightly,  by  her  father’s  side,  looping 
up  her  scattered  tresses  as  she  went,  laughing  at  the  struggles  of  her 
noisy  burden,  and  looking  up  with  rapture  at  her  father’s  gradually 
brightening  face,  Raphael  could  not  help  stealing  glance  after  glance, 
and  was  surprised  to  find  them  returned  with  a  bright,  honest,  smil¬ 
ing  gratitude,  which  met  him  full-eyed,  as  free  from  prudery  as  it 

was  from  coquetry . “A  lady  she  is,”  said  he  to  himself,  “but 

evidently  no  city  one.  There  is  nature,  or  something  else,  there, 
pure  and  unadulterated,  without  any  of  man’s  additions  or  beautifi¬ 
cations.”  And  as  he  looked  he  began  to  feel  it  a  pleasure,  such  as 
his  weary  heart  had  not  known  for  many  a  year,  simply  to  watch 
her . 

“  Positively  there  is  a  foolish  enjoyment  after  all  in  making  other 

fleas  smile . Ass  that  I  am  ?  As  if  I  had  not  drank  all  that  ditch- 

water  cup  to  the  dregs  years  ago  !  ” 

They  went  on  for  some  time  in  silence,  till  the  officer,  turning  to 
him,— 


154 


HYPATIA. 


“  And  may  I  ask  you  my  quaint  preserver,  whom  I  would  have 
thanked  before  but  for  this  foolish  faintness,  which  is  now  going  ofl, 
what  and  who  you  are  ?  ” 

“  A  flea,  sir, — a  flea, — nothing  more,” 

“  But  a  patrician  flea,  surely  ;  to  judge  by  your  language  and  man¬ 
ners  ?  ” 

“Not  that  exactly.  True,  I  have  been  rich,  as  the  saying  is;  I 
may  be  rich  again,  they  tell  me,  when  I  am  fool  enough  to  choose.” 

“  O  if  we  were  but  rich  !  ”  sighed  the  girl. 

“You  would  be  very  unhappy,  my  dear  young  lady.  Believe  a 
flea  who  has  tried  the  experiment  thoroughly.” 

“  Ah  !  but  we  could  ransom  my  brother  !  and  now  we  can  And  no 
money  till  we  get  back  to  Africa,” 

“  And  none  then,”  said  the  officer,  in  a  low  voice.  “  You  forget, 
my  poor  child,  that  I  mortgaged  the  whole  estate  to  raise  my  legion. 
We  must  not  shrink  from  looking  at  things  as  they  are,” 

“  Ah  !  and  he  is  prisoner  !  he  will  be  sold  as  a  slave, — perhaps — 
ah  !  perhaps  crucified,  for  he  is  not  a  Roman  !  0,  he  will  be  cruci¬ 
fied  !”  and  she  burst  into  an  agony  of  weeping . Suddenly  she 

dashed  away  her  tears,  and  looked  up  clear  and  bright  once  more. 
“  No  !  forgive  me,  father  !  God  will  protect  his  own!  ” 

“  My  dear  young  lady,”  said  Raphael,  “  if  you  really  dislike  such 
a  prospect  for  your  brother,  and  are  in  want  of  a  few  dirty  coins 
wherewith  to  prevent  it,  perhaps  I  may  be  able  to  find  you  them  in 
Ostia.” 

She  looked  at  him  incredulously,  as  her  eye  glanced  over  his  rags, 
and  then,  blushing,  begged  his  pardon  for  her  unspoken  thoughts. 

“  Well, — as  you  choose  to  suppose.  But  my  dog  has  been  so  civil 
to  you  already,  that  perhaps  she  may  have  no  objection  to  make  you 
a  present  of  that  necklace  of  hers.  I  will  go  to  the  rabbis,  and  we 
will  make  all  right  ;  so  don’t  cry.  I  hate  crying  ,  and  the  puppies 
are  quite  chorus  enough  for  the  present  tragedy.” 

“  The  rabbis?  Are  you  a  Jew  ?”  asked  the  officer. 

“  Yes,  sir,  a  Jew,  And  you,  I  presume,  a  Christian  ;  perhaps  you 
may  have  scruples  about  receiving — your  sect  has  generally  none 
about  taking — from  one  of  our  stubborn  and  unbelieving  race.  Don’t 
be  frightened,  though,  for  your  conscience  ;  I  assure  you  I  am  no 
more  a  Jew  at  heart  than  I  am  a  Christian.” 

“  God  help  you,  then  I  ” 

“  Some  one,  or  something,  has  helped  me  a  great  deal  too  much, 
for  three-and-thirty  years  of  pampering.  But,  pardon  me,  that  was 
a  strange  speech  for  a  Christian.” 

“  You  must  be  a  good  Jew,  sir,  before  you  can  be  a  good  Chris¬ 
tian.” 

“  Possibly,  I  intend  to  be  neither, — nor  a  good  Pagan  either.  My 
dear  sir,  let  us  drop  the  subject.  It  is  beyond  me.  If  I  can  be  as 
good  a  brute  animal  as  my  dog  there, — it  being  first  demonstrated 
that  it  is  good  to  be  good, — I  shall  be  very  well  content,” 


THE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  ABYtiS. 


155 


The  officer  looked  down  on  him  with  a  stately,  loving  sorrow. 
Raphael  caught  his  eye,  and  felt  that  he  was  in  the  presence  of  no 
common  man. 

“  I  must  take  care  what  I  say  here,  I  suspect,  or  I  shall  he  en¬ 
tangled  shortly  in  a  regular  Socratic  dialogue . And  now,  sir,  may 

I  return  your  question,  and  ask  who  and  what  are  you  ?  I  really 
have  no  intention  of  giving  you  up  to  any  Caesar,  Antiochus,  Tiglath- 

Pileser,  or  other  flea-devouring-iiea . They  will  fatten  well  enough 

without  your  blood.  So  I  only  ask  as  a  student  of  the  great  nothing- 
in-general,  which  men  call  the  universe.” 

“  I  was  prefect  of  a  legion  this  morning.  What  I  am  now,  you 
know  as  well  as  I.”  ^ 

“Just  what  I  do  not.  I  am  in  deep  wonder  at  seeing  your 
hilarity,  when,  by  all  flea-analogies,  you  ought  to  be  either  be- 
howling  your  fate  like  Achilles  on  the  shores  of  Styx,  or  pretending 
to  grin  and  bear  it,  as  I  was  taught  to  do  when  I  played  at  Stoicism. 
You  are  not  of  that  sect  certainly,  for  you  confessed  yourself  a  fool 
just  now.” 

“  And  it  would  be  long,  would  it  not,  before  you  made  one  of  them 
do  as  much?  Well,  be  it  so.  A  fool  I  am  ;  yet,  if  God  helps  us  as 
far  as  Ostia,  why  should  I  not  be  cheerful  ?  ” 

“  Why  should  you  ?” 

“  What  better  thing  can  happen  to  a  fool,  than  that  God  should 
teach  him  that  he  is  one,  when  he  fancied  himself  the  wisest  of  the 
wise  ?  Listen  to  me,  sir.  Four  months  ago  I  was  blessed  with 
health,  honor,  lands,  friends, — all  for  which  the  heart  of  man  could 
wish.  And  if,  for  an  insane  ambition,  I  have  chosen  to  risk  all  those, 
against  the  solemn  warnings  of  the  truest  friend,  and  the  wisest 
saint,  who  treads  this  earth  of  God’s,  should  not  I  rejoice  to  have  it 
proved  to  me,  even  by  such  a  lesson  as  this,  that  the  friend  who 
never  deceived  me  before  was  right  in  this  case  too  ;  and  that  the  God 
who  has  checked  and  turned  me  for  forty  years  of  wild  toil  and  war¬ 
fare,  whenever  I  dared  to  do  what  was  right  in  the  sight  of  my  own 
eyes,  has  not  forgotten  me  yet,  or  given  up  the  thankless  task  of  my 
education  ?  ” 

“  And  who,  pray,  is  this  peerless  friend  ?” 

“  Augustine  of  Hippo.” 

“  Humph  !  It  had  been  better  for  the  world  in  general,  if  the 
great  dialectician  had  exerted  his  powers  of  persuasion  on  Heraclian 
himself.” 

“  He  did  so,  but  in  vain.” 

“I  don’t  doubt  it.  I  know  the  sleek  Count  well  enough  to  judge 
what  effect  a  sermon  would  have  upon  that  smooth  vulpine  deter¬ 
mination  of  his . '  An  instrument  in  the  hands  of  God,  my  dear 

brother . We  must  obey  His  call,  even  to  the  death,  etc.,  etc.’  ” 

And  Raphael  laughed  bitterly. 

“  You  know  the  Count  ?” 


156 


HYPATIA. 


‘‘  As  well,  sir,  as  I  care  to  know  any  man.’' 

‘  ‘  I  am  sorry  for  your  eyesight  then,  sir,”  said  the  prefect,  severely, 
“  if  it  has  been  able  to  discern  no  more  than  that  in  so  august  a 
character.” 

“  My  dear  sir,  I  do  not  doubt  his  excellence, — nay,  his  inspiration. 
How  well  he  divined  the  perfectly  fit  moment  for  stabbing  his  old 
comrade,  Stilicho  !  But  really,  as  two  men  of  the  world,  we  must  be 
aware  by  this  time  that  every  man  has  his  price.”.  .  . . 

“  O,  hush  !  hush  !  ”  whispered  the  girl.  “  You  cannot  guess  how 
you  pain  him.  He  worships  the  Count.  It  was  not  ambition,  as 
he  pretends,  but  mere  loyalty  to  him,  which  brought  him  here 
against  his  will.” 

‘  ‘  My  dear  madam,  forgive  me.  For  your  sake  I  am  silent.  ” . . .  . 

“  For  her  sake  !  A  pretty  speech  for  me  !  What  next  ?  ”  said  he 
to  himself.  “  Ah,  Bran,  Bran,  this  is  all  your  fault  !  ” 

“  For  my  sake  ?  O,  why  not  for  your  own  sake  ?  How  sad  to  hear 
one — one  like  you,  only  sneering  and  speaking  evil  !  ” 

‘  ‘  Why,  then  ?  If  fools  are  fools,  and  one  can  safely  call  them  so, 
why  not  do  it  ?  ” 

“Ah,  if  God  was  merciful  enough  to  send  down  his  own  Son  to  die 
for  them,  should  we  not  be  merciful  enough  not  to  judge  their  fail¬ 
ings  harshly  ?  ” 

“  My  dear  young  lady,  spare  a  worn-out  philosopher  any  new 
anthropologic  theories.  We  leally  must  push  on  a  little  faster,  if  we 
intend  to  reach  Ostia  to-night.” 

But,  for  some  reason  or  other,  Raphael  sneered  no  more  for  a  full 
half-hour. 

Long,  however,  ere  they  reached  Ostia,  the  night  had  fallen  ;  and 
their  situation  began  to  be  more  than  questionably  safe.  Now  and 
then  a  wolf,  slinking  across  the  road  toward  his  ghastly  feast,  glided 
like  a  lank  ghost  out  of  the  darkness,  and  into  it  again,  answering 
Bran’s  growl  by  a  gleam  of  his  white  teeth.  Then  the  voices  of  some 
marauding  party  rung  coarse  and  loud  through  the  still  night,  and 
made  them  hesitate  and  stop  a  while.  And  at  last,  worst  of  all,  the 
measured  tramp  of  an  imperial  column  began  to  roll  like  distant 
thunder  along  the  plain  below.  They  were  advancing  upon  Ostia  ! 
What  if  they  arrived  there  before  the  routed  army  could  rally,  and 
defend  themselves  long  enough  to  re-embark  ?. . .  .What  if — a  thou¬ 
sand  ugly  possibilities  began  to  crowd  up. 

“Suppose  we  found  the  gates  of  Ostia  shut,  and  the  Imperialists 
bivouacked  outside  ?  ”  said  Raphael,  half  to  himself. 

“  God  would  protect  his  own,”  answered  the  girl ;  and  Raphael  had 
no  heart  to  rob  her  of  her  hope,  though  he  looked  upon  their  chances  of 
escape  as  growing  smaller  and  smaller  every  moment.  The  poor  girl 
was  weary ;  the  mule  weary  also  ;  and  as  they  crawled  along,  at  a 
pace  which  made  it  certain  that  the  fast  passing  column  would  be  at 
Ostia  an  hour  before  them,  to  join  the  van-guard  of  the  pursuers,  and 


THE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  ABY88. 


157 


aid  them  in  investing  the  town,  she  had  to  lean  again  and  again  on 
Raphael’s  arm.  Her  shoes,  unfitted  for  so  rough  a  journey,  had  been 
long  since  torn  olf,  and  her  tender  feet  were  marking  every  step  with 
blood.  Raphael  knew  it  by  her  faltering  gait  ;  and  remarked,  too, 
that  neither  sigh  nor  murmur  passed  her  lips.  But  as  for  helping  her, 
he  could  not  ;  and  began  to  curse  the  fancy  which  had  led  him  to 
eschew  even  sandals  as  unworthy  the  self-dependence  of  a  Cynic. 

And  so  they  crawled  along,  while  Raphael  and  the  prefect,  each 
guessing  the  terrible  thoughts  of  the  other,  were  thankful  for  the 
darkness  which  hid  their  despairing  countenances  from  the  young 
girl ;  she,  on  the  other  hand,  chatting  cheerfully,  almost  laughingly, 
to  her  silent  father. 

At  last  the  poor  child  stepped  on  some  stone  more  sharp  than  usual, 
—and,  with  a  sudden  writhe  and  shriek,  sunk  to  the  ground.  Ra¬ 
phael  lifted  her  up,  and  she  tried  to  proceed,  but  sunk  down  again . 

What  was  to  be  done  ? 

“1  expected  this,”  said  the  prefect,  ,  in  a  slow,  stately  voice. 
“Hear  me,  sir  !  Jew,  Christian,  or  philosopher,  God  seems  to  have 
bestowed  on  you  a  heart  which  I  can  trust.  To  your  care  I  commit 
this  girl, — your  property,  like  me,  by  right  of  war.  Mount  her  upon 
this  mule.  Hasten  with  her — where  you  will, — for  God  will  be 
there  also.  And  may  he  so  deal  with  you,  as  you  deal  with  her 
henceforth.  An  old  and  disgraced  soldier  can  do  no  more  than  die.” 

And  he  made  an  effort  to  dismount  ;  but,  fainting  from  his  wounds 
sunk  upon  the  neck  of  the  mule.  Raphael  and  his  daughter  caught 
him  in  their  arms. 

“  Father  !  Father  !  Impossible  !  Cruel  !  Oh — do  you  think 
that  I  would  have  followed  you  hither  from  Africa,  against  your  own 
entreaties^  to  desert  you  now  ?  ” 

“  My  daughter,  I  command  !  ” 

The  girl  remained  firm  and  silent. 

“How  long  have  you  learned  to  disobey  me?  Lift  the  old,  dis¬ 
graced  man  down,  sir,  and  leave  him  to  die  in  the  right  place — on 
the  battle-field  where  his  general  set  him.” 

The  girl  sunk  down  on  the  road  in  an  agony  of  weeping.  “  I  must 
help  myself,  I  see,”  said  her  father,  dropping  to  the  ground. 
“  Authority  vanishes  before  old  age  and  humiliation.  Victoria! 
Has  your  father  no  sins  to  answer  for  alread}'’,  that  you  will  send  him 
before  his  God  with  your  blood  too  upon  his  head  ?  ” 

Still  the  girl  sat  weeping  on  the  ground  ;  while  Raphael,  utterly 
at  his  wits’  end,  tried  hard  to  persuade  himself  that  it  was  no  con¬ 
cern  of  his. 

“  I  am  at  the  service  of  either  or  of  both,  for  life  or  death  ;  only 
be  so  good  as  to  settle  it  quickly. . .  .Hell  !  here  it  is  settled  for  us, 
with  a  vengeance  1  ” 

And  as  he  spoke,  the  tramp  and  jingle  of  horsemen  rung  along  the 
lane,  approaching  rapidly. 


158 


HYPATIA. 


In  an  instant  Victoria  had  sprung  to  her  feet. — weakness  and  pain 
had  vanished. 

“  There  is  one  chance, — one  chance  for  him  !  Lift  him  over  the 
bank,  sir  !  Lift  him  over,  while  I  run  forward  and  meet  them.  My 
death  will  delay  them  long  enough  for  you  to  save  him  !  ” 

“  Death?  ”  cried  Raphael,  seizing  her  by  the  arm.  “  If  that  were 
all - ” 

“  Grod  will  protect  his  own,”  answered  she,  calmly,  laying  her 
finger  on  her  lips  ;  and  then,  breaking  his  grasp  in  the  strength  of 
her  heroism,  vanished  into  the  night. 

Her  father  tried  to  follow  her,  but  fell  on  his  face  groaning. 
Raphael  lifted  him,  strove  to  drag  him  up  the  steep  bank  :  but  his 
knees  knocked  together  ;  a  faint  sweat  seemed  to  melt  every  limb. 

....There  was  a  pause,  which  seemed  ages  long . Nearer  and 

nearer  came  the  trampling.  ,  .  .A  sudden  gleam  of  the  moon  revealed 
Victoria  standing  with  outspread  arms,  right  before  the  horses’ 
heads,  A  heavenly  glory  seemed  to  bathe  her  from  head  to  foot. . . . 
or  was  it  tears  sparkling  in  his  own  eyes  ?. . .  .Then  the  grate  and  jar 

of  the  horse-hoofs  on  the  road,  as  they  pulled  up  suddenly . He 

turned  his  face  away  and  shut  his  eyes . 

“  What  are  you  ?”  thundered  a  voice. 

Victoria,  the  daughter  of  Majoricus  the  prefect.” 

The  voice  was  low,  but  yet  so  clear  and  calm  that  every  syllable 

rung  through  Aben-Ezra’s  tingling  ears . 

A  shout, — a  shriek, — the  confused  murmur  of  many  voices.  . .  .he 
looked  up  in  spite  of  himself, — a  horsem'an  had  sprung  to  the 
ground,  and  clasped  Victoria  in  his  arms.  The  human  heart  of  flesh, 
asleep  for  many  a  year,  leaped  into  mad  life  within  his  breast,  and, 
drawing  his  dagger,  he  rushed  into  the  throng, — 

“  Villians  !  Hellhounds  !  I  will  balk  you  !  She  shall  die  first  !  ” 

And  the  bright  blade  gleamed  over  Victoria’s  head . He  was 

struck  down — blinded — half  stunned — but  rose  again  with  the 

energy  of  madness . What  was  this  ?  Soft  arms  around  him. . . . 

Victoria’s  ! 

“  Save  him  !  spare  him  !  He  saved  us  !  Sir  !  It  is  my  brother  ! 
We  are  safe  !  O,  spare  the  dog  !  It  saved  my  father  !  ’ 

“  We  have  mistaken  each  other,  indeed,  sir  !”  said  a  gay  young 
tribune,  in  a  voice  trembling  with  joy,  “  Where  is  my  father?” 

“Fifty  yards  behind.  Down,  Bran!  Quiet!  O  Solomon  mine 
ancestor,  why  did  you  not  prevent  me  making  such  an  egregious  fool 
of  myself  !  Why,  I  shall  be  forced,  in  self -justification,  to  carry 
through  the  farce  !  ” 

There  is  no  use  telling  what  followed  during  the  next  five  minutes, 
at  the  end  of  which  time  Raphael  found  himself  astride  of  a  goodly 
war-horse,  by  the  side  of  the  young  tribune,  who  carried  Victoria  be¬ 
fore  him.  Two  soldiers  in  the  mean  time  were  supporting  the  prefect 
on  his  mule,  and  convincing  that  stubborn  bearer  of  burdens  that  it ' 


THE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  ABYSS. 


159 


was  not  quite  so  unaMe  to  trot  as  it  had  fancied,  by  the  combined 
arguments  of  a  drench  of  wine  and  two  sword-points,  while  they 
heaped  their  general  with  blessings,  and  kissed  his  hands  and  feet 

“  Your  father’s  soldiers  seem  to  consider  themselves  in  debt  to  him  : 
not,  surely,  for  taking  them  where  they  could  best  run  away  ?  ” 

“Ah,  poor  fellows  !”  said  the  tribune  ;  “  we  have  had  as  real  a 
panic  among  us  as  I  ever  read  of  in  Arrian  or  Polybius.  But  he  has 
been  a  father  rather  than  a  general  to  them.  It  is  not  often  that,  out 
of  a  routed  army,  twenty  gallant  men  will  volunteer  to  ride  back  into 
the  enemy’s  ranks,  on  the  chance  of  an  old  man’s  breathing  still.” 

“Then  you  knew  where  to  find  us  ?  ”  said  Victoria. 

“  Some  of  them  knew.  And  he  himself  showed  us  this  very  by¬ 
road  yesterday,  when  we  took  up  our  ground,  and  told  us  it  might 
be  of  service  on  occasion, — and  so  it  has  been.” 

“But  they  told  me  that  you  were  taken  prisoner.  O  the  torture  I 
have  suffered  for  you  !  ” 

“  Silly  child  !  Did  you  fancy  my  father’s  son  would  be  taken  alive  ? 
I  and  the  first  troop  got  over  the  garden  walls,  and  cut  our  way  out 
into  the  plain,  three  hours  ago.” 

“  Did  I  not  tell  you,”  said  Victoria,  leaning  toward  Raphael,  “that 
God  would  protect  his  own?” 

“You  did,”  answered  he  ;  and  fell  into  a  long  and  silent  medita¬ 
tion 


! 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

THE  HOCKS  OF  THE  SIRENS. 

These  four  montlis  liad  been  busy  and  eventful  enough  to  Hypatia 
and  to  Philammon  ;  yet  the  events  and  the  business  were  of  so  gradual 
and  uniform  a  tenor,  that  it  is  as  well  to  pass  quickly  ovei*  them,  and 
show  what  had  happened  principally  by  its  effects. 

The  robust  and  fiery  desert  lad  w^as  now  metamorphosed  into  the 
pale  and  thoughtful  student,  oppressed  with  the  w^eight  of  careful 
thought  and  weary  memory.  But  those  remembrances  were  all  recent 
ones.  With  his  entrance  into  Hypatia’s  lecture- room,  and  into  the 
fairy  realms  of  Greek  thought,  a  new  life  had  begun  for  him  ;  and 
the  Laura,  and  Pambo,  and  Arsenins,  seemed  dim  phantoms  from 
some  antenatal  existence,  which  faded  day  by  day  before  the  inrush 
of  new  and  startling  knowledge. 

But  though  the  friends  and  scenes  of  his  childhood  had  fallen  back 
so  swiftly  into  the  far  horizon,  he  was  not  lonely.  His  heart  found  a 
lovelier,  if  not  a  healthier  home,  than  it  had  ever  known  before. 
For  during  those  four  peaceful  and  busy  months  of  study  there  had 
sprung  up  between  Hypatia  and  the  beautiful  boy  one  of  those  pure 
and  yet  passionate  friendships, — call  them  rather,  wuth  St.  Augustine, 
by  the  sacred  name  of  love, — which,  fair  and  holy  as  they  are  when 
they  link  youth  to  youth,  or  girl  to  girl,  reach  their  full  perfection 
only  between  man  and  woman.  The  unselfish  adoration  with  which 
a  maiden  may  bow  dowm  before  some  strong  and  holy  priest,  or  with 
which  an  enthusiastic  boy  may  cling  to  the  wise  and  tender  matron, 
who,  amid  the  turmoil  of  the  world,  and  the  pride  of  beauty,  and  the 
cares  of  wifehood,  bends  down  to  him  with  counsel  and  encourage¬ 
ment, — earth  knows  no  fairer  bonds  than  these,  save  wedded  love 
itself.  And  that  second  relation,  motherly  rather  than  sisterly,  had 
bound  Philammon  with  a  golden  chain  to  the  wondrous  maid  of 
Alexandria. 

From  the  commencement  of  his  attendance  in  her  lecture-room  she 
had  suited  her  discourses  to  what  she  fancied  were  his  especial 
spiritual  needs  ;  and  many  a  glance  of  the  eye  toward  him,  on  any 
peculiarly  important  sentence,  set  the  poor  boy’s  heart  beating  at  that 
sign  that  the  words  were  meant  for  him.  But  before  a  month  was 
past,  won  by  the  intense  attention  with  which  he  watched  for  every 
utterance  of  hers,  she  had  persuaded  her  father  to  give  him  a  place 
in  the  library  as  one  of  his  pupils,  among  the  youths  who  were 

(160) 


B0GK8  OF  TSE  BIHENS,  l6l 

employed  there  daily  in  transcribing,  as  well  as  in  studying,  the 
authors  then  in  fashion. 

She  saw  him  at  first  but  seldom, — more  seldom  than  she  would  have 
wished :  but  she  dreaded  the  tongue  of  scandal,  heathen  as  well  as 
Christian,  and  contented  herself  with  inquiring  daily  from  her  father 
about  the  progress  of  the  boy.  And  when  at  times  she  entered  for  a 
moment  the  library,  where  he  sat  writing,  or  passed  him  on  her  way 
to  the  Museum,  a  look  was  interchanged,  on  her  part  of  most  gracious 
approval,  and  on  his  of  adoring  gratitude,  which  was  enough  for  both. 
Her  spell  was  working  surely  ;  and  she  was  too  confident  in  her  own 
cause  and  her  own  powers  to  wish  to  hurry  that  transformation  for 
which  she  so  fondly  hoped. 

‘  ‘  He  must  begin  at  the  beginning,”  thought  she  to  herself.  ‘  ‘Mathe¬ 
matics  and  the  Parmenides  are  enough  for  him  as  yet.  Without  a 
training  in  the  liberal  sciences  he  cannot  gain  a  faith  worthy  of  those 
gods  to  whom  some  day  I  shall  present  him  ;  and  I  should  find  his 
Christian  ignorance  and  fanaticism  transferred,  whole  and  rude,  to 
the  service  of  those  gods  whose  shrine  is  unapproachable  save  to  the 
spiritual  man,  who  has  passed  through  the  successive  vestibules  of 
science  and  philosox^hy. 

But  soon,  attracted  herself,  as  much  as  wishing  to  attract  him,  she 
em])loyed  him  in  copying  manuscripts  for  her  own  use.  She  sent 
back  his  themes  and  declamations,  corrected  with  her  own  hand  ; 
and  Philammon  laid  them  by  in  his  little  garret  at  Eudaemon’s  house 
as  precious  badges  of  l^onor,  after  exhibiting  them  to  the  reverential 
and  envious  gaze  of  tho  little  porter.  So  he  toiled  on,  early  and 
late,  counting  himself  ^/c]l  paid  for  a  week’s  intense  exertion  by  a, 
single  smile,  or  word  uf  approbation,  and  went  home  to  pour  out  his 
soul  to  his  host  on  the  <  ae  inexhaustible  theme  which  they  had  in 
common, — Hypatia  and  r  perfections.  He  would  have  raved  often 

enough  on  the  same  suLjh-!;  to  his  fellow-pupils,  but  he  shrunk,  not 
only  from  their  artificial  elty  manners,  but  also  from  their  morality, 
for  suspecting  which  he  saw  but  too  good  cause.  He  longed  to  go 
out  into  the  streets,  to  |  eclaim  to  the  whole  world  the  treasure 
which  he  had  found,  and  l?!.  on  all  to  come  and  share  it  with  him. 
F«’  there  was  no  jealousy  in  that  pure  love  of  his.  Could  he  have 
seen  her  lavishing  on  thousands  far  greater  favors  than  she  had  con¬ 
ferred  on  him,  he  would  have  rejoiced  in  the  thought  that  there  were 
so  many  more  blest  beings  upon  earth,  and  have  loved  them  all  and 
every  one  as  brothers,  for  having  deserved  her  notice.  Her  very 
beauty,  when  his  first  flush  of  wonder  was  past,  he  ceased  to  men¬ 
tion, — ceased  even  to  think  of  it.  Of  course  she  must  be  beautiful. 
It  was  her  right ;  the  natural  complement  of  her  other  graces  :  but 
it  was  to  him  only  what  the  mother’s  smile  is  to  the  infant,  the  sun¬ 
light  to  the  sky-lark,  the  mountain  breeze  to  the  hunter, — an  inspir¬ 
ing  element,  on  which  he  fed  unconsciously.  Only  when  he  doubted 
for  a  moment  some  especially  startling  or  fanciful  assertion,  did  he 
IIYrxVTIA — 6 


16S 


HYPATIA. 


% 

become  really  aware  of  the  great  loveliness  of  her  who  made  it;  and 
then  his  heart  silenced  his  judgment  with  the  thought, — Could  any 
but  true  words  come  out  of  those  perfect  lips? — any  but  royal 
thoughts  take  shape  within  that  queenly  head?  .  ,  .  Poor  fool!  Yet 
was  it  not  natural  enough? 

Then,  gradually,  as  she  passed  the  boy,  poring  over  his  book  in 
some  alcove  of  the  Museum  gardens,  she  would  invite  him  by  a 
glance  to  join  the  knot  of  loungers  and  questioners  who  dangled 
about  her  and  her  father,  and  fancied  themselves  to  be  reproducing 
the  days  of  the  Athenian  sages  amid  the  groves  of  another  Academus. 
Sometimes,  even,  she  had  beckoned  him  to  her  side  as  she  sat  in 
some  retired  arbor,  attended  only  by  her  father;  and  there  some  pass¬ 
ing  observation,  earnest  and  personal,  however  lofty  and  measured, 
made  him  aware,  as  it  was  intended  to  do,  that  she  had  a  deeper  in¬ 
terest  in  him,  a  livelier  sympathy  for  him,  than  for  the  many;  that 
he  was  in  her  eyes,  not  merely  a  pupil  to  be  instructed,  but  a  soul 
whom  she  desired  to  educate.  And  those  delicious  gleams  of  sun¬ 
light  grew  more  frequent  and  more  protracted  ;  for  by  each  she  sat- 
isfi('d  herself  more  and  more  that  she  had  not  mistaken  either  his 
powers  or  his  susceptibilities  ;  and  in  each,  whether  in  public  or  pri¬ 
vate,  Philammon  seemed  to  bear  himself  more  worthily.  For,  over 
and  above  the  natural  ease  and  dignity  which  accompanies  physical 
beauty,  and  the  modesty,  self-restraint,  and  deep  earnestness,  which 
he  had  acquired  under  the  discipline  of  the  Laura,  his  Greek  charac¬ 
ter  was  developing  itself  in  all  its  quickness,  subtlety,  and  versa¬ 
tility,  until  he  seemed  to  Hypatia  some  young  Titan,  by  the  side  of 
the  flippant,  hasty,  and  insincere  talkers  who  made  up  her  chosen 
circle. 

But  man  can  no  more  live  upon  Platonic  love  than  on  the  more 
prol.fic  species  of  that  common  ailment;  and  for  the  first  month 
Philammon  would  have  gone  hungry  to  his  couch  full  many  a  night, 
to  lie  awake  from  baser  causes  than  philosophic  meditation,  had  it 
not  been  for  his  magnanimous  host,  who  never  lost  heart  for  a  mo¬ 
ment,  either  about  himself  or  any  other  human  being.  As  for  Phil¬ 
ammon  going  out  with  him  to  earn  his  bread,  he  would  not  hear 
of  it.  Did  he  suppose  that  he  could  meet  any  of  those  monkish  ras¬ 
cals  in  the  street,  without  being  knocked  down  and  carried  off  by 
main  force?  And  beside,  there  was  a  sort  of  impiety  in  allowing  so 
hopeful  a  student  to  neglect  the  “  Divine  Ineffable  ”  in  order  to  sup¬ 
ply  the  base  necessities  of  the  teeth.  So  he  should  pay  no  rent  for 
his  lodgings, — positively  none  ;  and  as  for  eatables, — why,  he  must 
himself  work  a  little  harder  in  order  to  cater  for  both.  Had  not  all 
his  neighbors  their  litters  of  children  to  provide  for,  while  he,  thanks 
to  the  immortals,  had  been  far  too  wise  to  burden  the  earth  with  ani¬ 
mals  who  would  add  to  the  ugliness  of  their  father  the  Tartarean 
hue  of  their  mother?  And  after  all,  Philammon  could  pay  him  back 
when  he  became  a  great  sophist,  and  made  money,  as  of  course  he 


THE  BOOKS  OF  THE  SIRENS. 


163 


would  some  day  or  other  ;  and  in  the  mean  time,  something  might 
turn  up, — things  were  always  turning  up  for  those  whom  the  gods 
favored  ;  and  besides,  he  had  fully  ascertained  that,  on  the  day  on 
which  he  first  met  Philammon,  the  planets  were  favorable,  the  Mer¬ 
cury  being  in  something  or  other,  he  forgot  what,  with  Helios,  which 
portended  for  Philammon,  in  his  opinion,  a  similar  career  with  that 
of  the  glorious  and  devout  Emperor  Julian, 

Philammon  winced  somewhat  at  the  hint,  which  seemed  to  have  an 
ugly  verisimilitude  in  it  :  but  still,  philosophy  he  must  learn,  and 
bread  he  must  eat  ;  so  he  submitted. 

But  one  evening,  a  few  days  after  he  had  been  admitted  as  Theon’s 
pupil,  he  found,  to  his  astonishment,  lying  on  the  table  in  his  garret, 
an  undeniable .  glittering  gold  piece.  He  took  it  down  to  the  porter 
the  next  morning,  and  begged  him  to  discover  the  owner  of  the  lost 
coin,  and  return  it  duly.  But  what  was  his  surprise,  when  the  little 
man,  amid  endless  capers  and  gesticulations,  informed  him,  with  an 
air  of  mystery,  that  it  was  anything  but  lost  ;  that  his  arrears  of  rent 
had  been  paid  for  him  ;  and  that,  by  the  bounty  of  the  upper  powers, 
a  fresh  piece  of  coin  would  be  forthcoming  every  month.  In  vain 
Philammon  demanded  to  know  who  was  his  benefactor.  Eudaemon 
resolutely  kept  the  secret,  and  imprecated  a  whole  Tartarus  of  un¬ 
necessary  curses  on  his  wife  if  she  allowed  her  female  garrulity — 
though  the  poor  creature  seemed  never  to  open  her  lips  from  morn¬ 
ing  till  night — to  betray  so  great  a  mystery. 

Who  was  the  unknown  friend  ?  There  was  but  one  person  who 
could  have  done  it. . .  .And  yet  he  dared  not — the  thought  was  too 
delightful — think  that  it  was  she.  It  must  have  been  her  father. 
The  old  man  had  asked  him  more  than  once  about  the  state  of  his 
purse.  True,  he  had  always  returned  evasive  answers  ;  but  the  kind 
old  man  must  have  divined  the  truth.  Ought  he  not — must  he  not — 
go  and  thank  him?  No  ;  perhaps  it  was  more  courteous  to  say  noth¬ 
ing,  If  he — she — for  of  course  she  had  permitted,  perhaps  advised, 
the  gift— had  intended  him  to  thank  them,  would  they  have  so  care¬ 
fully  concealed  their  own  generosity  ?...  .Be  it  so  then.  But  how 
would  he  not  repay  them  for  it  !  How  delightful  to  be  in  her  debt 
for  anything — for  everything?  Would  that  he  could  have  the  en¬ 
joyment  of  owing  her  existence  itself  ! 

So  he  took  the  coin,  bought  unto  himself  a  cloak  of  the  most  philo¬ 
sophic  fashion,  and  went  his  way,  such  as  it  was,  rejoicing. 

But  his  faith  in  Christianity  ?  What  had  become  of  that  ? 

What  usually  happens  in  such  cases.  It  was  not  dead ;  but 
nevertheless  it  had  fallen  fast  asleep  for  the  time  being.  He  did  not 
disbelieve  it  :  he  would  have  been  shoclved  to  hear  such  a  thing  as¬ 
serted  of  him  ;  but  he  happened  to  be  busy  believing  something  else, — 
geometry,  conic  sections.  Cosmogonies,  psychologies,  and  what  not. 
And  so  it  befell  that  he  had  not  just  then  time  to  believe  in  Chris¬ 
tianity.  He  recollected  at  times  its  existence  .  but  even  then,  he 


164 


S[tPATiA. 


neither  affirmed  nor  denied  it.  When  he  had  solved  the  great  ques¬ 
tions, — those  which  Hypatia  set  forth,  as  the  roots  of  all  knowledge, 

■ — how  the  world  was  made,  and  what  was  the  origin  of  evil,  and 
what  his  own  personality  was,  and — that  being  settled — whether  he 
had  one,  with  a  few  other  preliminary  matters,  then  it  would  be  time 
to  return,  with  his  enlarged  light,  m  the  study  of  Christianity  ;  and 
if,  of  course,  Christianity  should  be  found  to  be  at  variance  with  that 
enlarged  light,  as  Hypatia  seemed  to  think ....  Why,  then — What 
then ?...  .He  would  not  think  about  such  disagreeable  possibilities. 
Sufficient  for  the  day  was  the  evil  thereof.  Possibilities  ?  It  was 
impossible . Philosophy  could  not  mislead.  Had  not  Hypatia  de¬ 

fined  it  as  man’s  search  after  the  unseen  ?  And  if  he  found  the  un¬ 
seen  by  it,  did  it  not  come  to  just  the  same  thing  as  if  the  unseen  had 
had  revealed  itself  to  him  ?  And  he  must  find  it, — for  logic  and 
mathematics  could  not  err.  If  every  step  was  correct,  the  conclusion 
must  be  correct  also  ;  so  he  must  end,  after  all,  in  the  right  path, — 
that  is,  of  course,  supposing  Christianity  to  be  the  right  path, — 
and  return  to  fight  the  Church’s  battles,  with  the  sword  which  he 

had  wrested  from  Goliath,  the  Philistine . But  he  had  not  won  the 

sword  yet ;  and  in  the  mean  while,  learning  was  weary  work ;  and 
sufficient  for  the  day  was  the  good,  as  well  as  the  evil,  thereof. 

So,  enabled  by  his  gold  coin  each  month  to  devote  himself  entirely 
to  stiidy,  he  became  very  much  what  Peter  would  have  coarsely 
teriiiod  a  heathen.  At  first,  indeed,  he  slipped  into  the  Christian 
Churches,  from  a  habit  of  conscience.  But  babies  soon  grow  sleepy  ; 
the  fear  of  discovery  and  recapture  made  his  attendance  more  and 
more  of  a  labor.  And  keeping  himself  apart  as  much  as  possible 
from  the  congregation,  as  a  lonely  and  secret  worshiper,  he  soon 
found  himself  as  separate  from  them  in  heart  as  in  daily  life.  He 
felt  that  they,  and,  even  more  than  they,  those  flowery  and  bombas¬ 
tic  pulpit  rhetoricians,  who  were  paid  for  their  sermons  by  the  clap¬ 
ping  and  cheering  of  the  congregation,  were  not  thinking  of,  longing 
after,  the  same  things  as  himself.  Besides,  he  never  spoke  to  a  Chris¬ 
tian  ;  for  the  negress  at  his  lodgings  seemed  to  avoid  him, — whether 
from  modesty  or  terror,  he  could  not  tell  ;  and  cut  ofl;  thus  from  the 
outward  “  communion  of  saints,”  ho  found  himself  fast  parting  away 
from  the  inward  one.  So  he  went  no  more  to  church  ;  and  looked  the 
other  way,  he  hardly  knew  why,  whenever  he  passed  the  Ceesareum  ; 
and  Cyril,  and  all  his  mighty  organization,  became  to  him  another 
world,  with  which  he  had.  even  less  to  do  than  with  those  planets 
over  his  head,  whose  mysterious  movements  and  symbolisms  and  in¬ 
fluences  Hypatia’s  lectures  on  astronomy  were  just  opening  before 
his  bewildered  imagination. 

Hypatia  watched  all  this  growing  self-satisfaction,  and  fed  herself 
with  the  dream  that  through  Philammon  she  might  see  her  wildest 
hopes  realized.  After  the  manner  of  women,  she  crowned  him,  in 
her  own  imagination,  with  all  powers  and  excellences  which  she 


The  rocks  of  the  sirejts. 


165 


would  have  wished  him  to  possess,  as  well  as  with  those  which  he 
actually  manifested,  till  Philammon  would  have  been  as  much  as¬ 
tonished  as  self -glorified  could  he  have  seen  the  idealized  caricature 
of  himself  which  the  sweet  enthusiast  had  painted  for  her  private 
enjoyment.  They  were  blissful  months,  those,  to  poor  Hypatia. 
Orestes,  for  some  reason  or  other,  had  neglected  to  urge  his  suit,  and 
the  Iphigenia  sacrifice  had  retired  mercifully  into  the  background. 
Perhaps  she  should  be  able  now  to  accomplish  all  without  it.  And 
yet — it  was  so  long  to  wait!  Years  might  pass  before  Philammon’s 
education  was  matured,  and  with  them  golden  opportunities  which 
might  never  recur  again.  ’ 

“  Ah  1”  she  sighed  at  times,  “  that  Julian  had  lived  a  generation 
later!  That  I  could  have  brought  all  my  hard-earned  treasures  to 
the  feet  of  the  Poet  of  the  Sun,  and  cried,  ‘  Take  me! — Hero,  warrior, 
statesman,  sage,  priest  of  the  God  of  Light!  Take  thy  slave!  Com¬ 
mand  her — send  her — to  martyrdom,  if  thou  wilt !  ’  A  petty  price  would 
that  have  been  wherewith  to  buy  the  honor  of  being  the  meanest  of 
thy  apostles,  the  fellow-laborer  of  Tamblichus,  Maximus,  Ubanius, 
and  the  choir  of  sages  who  upheld  the  thron,&  of  the  last  true  Caesar!  ” 


CHAPTER  XV. 


NEPHELOCOCCUGUIA. 

Hypatia  had  always  avoided  carefully  discussing  with  Philammon 
any  of  those  points  on  which  she  differed  from  his  former  faith.  She 
Was  content  to  let  the  divine  light  of  philosophy  penetrate  by  its  own 
power,  and  educe  its  own  conclusions.  But  one  day,  at  the  very  time 
at  which  this  history  re-opens,  she  was  tempted  to  speak  more  openly 
to  her  pupil  than  she  yet  had  done.  Her  father  had  introduced  him. 
a  few  days  before,  to  a  new  work  of  hers  on  mathematics  ;  and  the 
delighted  and  adoring  look  with  which  the  boy  welcomed  her,  as  he 
met  her  in  the  Museum  gardens,  pardonably  tempted  her  curiosity  to 
inquire  what  miracles  her  own  wisdom  might  have  already  worked. 
She  stopped  in  her  walk,  and  motioned  her  father  to  begin  a  conver¬ 
sation  with  Philammon. 

“  Well  !  ”  asked  the  old  man,  with  an  encouraging  smile,  “  and  h,o^/»^ 
does  our  pupil  like  his  new - ” 

“You  mean  my  conic  sections,  father?  It  is  hardly  fair  to  expect 
an  unbiased  answer  in  my  presence.” 

“  Why  so?  ”  said  Philammon.  “  Why  should  I  not  tell  you,  as  'Veil 
as  all  the  world,  the  fresh  and  wonderful  field  of  thought  whicA  they 
have  opened  to  me,  in  a  few  short  hours?” 

“  What  then?”  asked  Hypatia,  smiling,  as  if  she  knew  wTiat  the 
answer  would  be.  ‘  ‘  In  what  does  my  commentary  differ  ^rom  the 
original  text  of  Apollonius,  on  which  I  have  so  faithfully  based  it  ?  ” 

“0,  as  much  as  a  living  body  differs  from  a  dead  one.  instead  of 
mere  disquisitions  on  the  properties  of  lines  and  ci’rven,  I  found  a 
mine  of  poetry  and  theology.  Even  dull  mathematical  formula  seemed 
transfigured,  as  if  by  a  miracle,  into  the  symbol  of  some  deep  and 
noble  principle  of  the  unseen  world.” 

“  And  do  you  think  that  he  of  Perga  did  not  see  us  much  ?  or  that 
we  can  pretend  to  surpass,  in  depth  of  insight,  the  sages  of  the  elder 
world  ?  Be  sure  that  they,  like  the  poets,  meant  only  spiritual  things, 
even  when  they  seem  to  talk  only  of  physical  ones,  and  concealed  heaven 
under  an  earthly  garb  only  to  hide  it  from  die  eyes  of  the  profane  ; 
while  we,  in  these  degenerate  days,  must  interpret  and  display  each 
detail  to  the  dull  ears  of  men.” 

“  Do  you  think,  my  young  friend,”  asked  Theon,  “that  mathemat¬ 
ics  can  be  valuable  to  the  philosopher  otherwise  than  as  vehicles  of 
spiritual  truth  ?  Are  we  co  study  numbers  merely  that  we  may  be 

(166) 


NEPSELOCOCCm  VIA. 


16^ 


able  to  keep  accounts  ;  or  as  Pythagoras  did,  in  order  to  deduce  from 
their  laws  the  ideas  by  which  the  universe,  man.  Divinity  itself,  con¬ 
sists  ?  ” 

“  That  seems  to  me  certainly  to  be  the  nobler  purpose.” 

“Or  conic  sections,  that  we  mav  know  better  how  to  construct 
machinery  ;  or  rather  to  devise  from  them  symbols  of  the  relations  of 
Deity  to  its  various  emanations  ?  ” 

“You  use  your  dialectic  like  Socrates  himself,  my  father,”  said 
Hypatia. 

“  If  I  do,  it  is  only  for  a  temporary  purpose.  I  should  be  sorry 
to  accustom  Philammon  to  suppose  that  the  essence  of  philosophy 
was  to  be  found  in  those  minute  investigations  of  words  and  analyses 
of  notions,  which  seem  to  constitute  Plato’s  chief  power  in  the  eyes  of 
those,  who,  like  the  Christian  sophist  Augustine,  worship  his  letter 
while  they  neglect  his  spirit ;  not  seeing  that  those  dialogues,  which 

they  fancy  the  shrine  itself,  are  but  vestibules - ” 

“  Say  rather,  veils,  father.” 

“  Veils,  indeed,  which  were  intended  to  baffle  the  rude  gaze  of  the 
carnal  minded  ;  but  still  vestibules,  through  which  the  enlightened 
soul  might  be  led  up  to  the  inner  sanctuary,  to  the  Hesperid  gardens 

and  golden  fruit  of  the  Timseus  and  the  oracles . And  for  myself, 

were  but  those  two  books  left,  I  care  not  whether  every  other  writing 
in  the  world  perished  to-morrow.”* 

“  You  must  except  Homer,  father.” 

“  Yes,  for  the  herd . But  of  what  use  would  he  be  to  them  with¬ 

out  some  spiritual  commentary  ?  ” 

“  He  would  tell  them  as  little,  perhaps,  as  the  circle  tells  to  the 
carpenter  who  draws  one  with  his  compasses.” 

“  And  what  is  the  meaning  of  the  circle  ?  ”  asked  Philammon. 

“  It  may  have  infinite  meanings,  like  every  other  natural  phenom¬ 
enon  ;  and  deeper  meanings  in  proportion  to  the  exaltation  of  the 
soul  which  beholds  it.  But,  consider,  is  it  not,  as  the  one  perfect 
figure,  the  very  symbol  of  the  totality  of  the  spiritual  world ; 
which,  like  it,  is  invisible,  except  at  its  circumference,  where  it  is 
limited  by  the  dead,  gross  phenomena  of  sensuous  matter?  And 
even  as  the  circle  takes  its  origin  from  one  center,  itself  unseen, — 
a  point,  as  Euclid  defines  it,  whereof  neither  parts  nor  magnitude  can 
be  predicated, — does  not  the  world  of  spirits  revolve  round  one 
abysmal  being,  unseen  and  indefinable, — in  itself,  as  I  have  so  often 
preached,  nothing,  for  it  is  conceivable  only  by  the  negation  of  all 
properties,  even  of  those  of  reason,  virtue,  force  :  and  yet,  like  the 
center  of  the  circle,  the  cause  of  all  other  existences  ?  ” 

“I  see,”  said  Philammon;  for  the  moment,  certainly,  the  said 
abysmal  Deity  struck  him  as  a  somewhat  chill  and  barren  notion 


*  This  astounding  speech  is  usually  attributed  to  Proclus,  Hypatia’s  “great  ”  suc¬ 
cessor. 


16§ 


EfPATIA. 


. . .  .but  that  might  be  caused  only  by  the  dullness  of  liis  own 
spiritual  perceptions.  At  all  events,  if  it  was  a  logical  conclusion,  it 
must  be  right. 

“  Let  that  be  enough  for  the  present.  Hereafter  you  may  be — I 
fancy  that  I  know  you  well  enough  to  prophesy  that  you  will  be — 
able  to  recognize  in  the  equilateral  triangle  inscribed  within  the 
circle,  and  touching  it  only  with  its  angles,  the  three  supra-sensual 
principles  of  existence,  'wdiich  are  contained  in  Deity  as  it  manifests 
itself  in  the  physical  universe,  coinciding  with  its  utmost  limits,  and 
yet,  like  it,  independent  on  that  unseen  central  One  which  none  dare 
name.” 

“Ah  !”  said  poor  Philammon,  blushing  scarlet  at  the  sense  of  his 
own  dullness,  “  I  am,  indeed,  not  worthy  to  have  such  wisdom 

wasted  upon  my  imperfect  apprehension . But,  if  I  may  dare  to  ask 

. . .  .does  not  Apollonius  regard  the  circle,  like  all  other  curves,  as  not 
depending  primarily  on  its  own  center  for  its  existence,  but  as 
generated  by  the  section  of  any  cone  by  a  plane  at  right  angles  to  its 
axis  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  But  must  we  not  draw,  or  at  least  conceive,  a  circle,  in  order  to 
produce  that  cone  ?  And  is  not  the  axis  of  that  cone  determined  by 
the  center  of  that  circle  ?  ” 

Philammon  stood  rebuked. 

“  Do  not  be  ashamed  ;  you  have  only,  unwittingly,  laid  open 
another,  and  perhaps  as  deep  a  symbol.  Can  you  guess  what 
it  is?” 

Philammon  puzzled  in  vain. 

‘  ‘  Does  it  not  show  you  this  ?  That,  as  every  conceivable  right 
section  of  the  cone  discloses  the  circle,  so  in  all  which  is  fair  and 
symmetric  you  will  discover  Deity,  if  you  but  analyze  it  in  a  right 
and  symmetric  direction?  ” 

“  Beautiful  !”  said  Philammon  ;  while  the  old  man  added, — 

“  And  does  it  not  show  us,  too,  how  the  one  perfect  and  original 
philosophy  may  be  discovered  in  all  great  writers,  if  we  have  but 
that  scientific  knowledge  which  will  enable  us  to  extract  it  ?  ” 

“True,  my  father:  but  just  now,  I  wish  Philammon,  by  such 
thoughts  as  I  have  suggested,  to  rise  to  that  higher  and  more  spirit¬ 
ual  insight  into  nature,  which  reveals  her  to  us  as  instinct  through¬ 
out — all  fair  and  noble  forms  of  her  at  least — with  Deity  itself  :  to 
make  him  feel  that  it  is  not  enough  to  say,  with  the  Christians, 
that  God  has  made  the  world,  if  we  make  that  very  assertion  an 
excuse  for  believing  that  his  presence  has  been  ever  since  withdrawn 
from  it.” 

“  Christians,  I  think,  would  hardly  say  that,”  said  Philammon. 

“  Not  in  words.  But,  in  fact,  they  regard  Deity  as  the  maker  of  a 
dead  machine,  which,  once  made,  will  move  of  itself  thenceforth, 
and  repudiate  as  heretics  every  philosophic  thinker,  whether  Gnostic 
or  Platonist,  who,  unsatisfied  with  so  dead,  barren,  and  sordid  a  con- 


NEPHELOCOGCm  VIA. 


169 


ception  of  tlie  glorious  all,  wishes  to  honor  the  Deity  by  acknowledg¬ 
ing  his  universal  presence,  and  to  believe,  honestly,  the  assertion  of 
their  own  Scriptures,  that  He  lives  and  moves  and  has  his  being  in 
the  universe.” 

Philammon  gently  suggested  that  the  passage  in  question  was 
worded  somewhat  differently  in  the  Scripture. 

“  True.  But  if  the  one  be  true,  its  converse  will  be  true  also.  If 
the  universe  lives  and  moves  and  has  its  being  in  Him,  must  He  not 
necessarily  pervade  all  things  ?  ” 

“Why? — Forgive  my  dullness  and  explain.” 

“  Because  if  He  did  not  pervade  all  things,  those  things  which  He 
did  not  pervade  would  be  as  it  were  interstices  in  His  being,  and,  in 
so  far,  without  Him.” 

“  True,  but  still  they  would  be  within  his  circumference.” 

“Well  argued.  But  yet  they  would  not  live  in  Him,  but  in  them¬ 
selves.  To  live  in  Him  they  must  be  pervaded  by  His  life.  Do  you 
think  it  possible — do  you  think  it  even  reverent — to  affirm  that  there 
can  be  anything  within  the  infinite  glory  of  Deity  which  has  the 
power  of  excluding  from  the  space  which  it  occupies  that  very  being 
from  which  it  draws  its  worth,  and  which  must  have  originally  per¬ 
vaded  that  thing,  in  order  to  bestow  on  it  its  organization  and  its 
life  ?  Does  He  retire  after  creating,  from  the  spaces  which  he  occu¬ 
pied  during  creation,  reduced  to  the  base  necessity  of  making  room 
for  his  own  universe,  and  endure  the  suffering — for  the  analogy  of 
all  material  nature  tells  us  that  it  is  suffering — of  a  foreign  body  like 
a  thorn  within  the  flesh,  subsisting  within  His  own  substance? 
Rather  believe  that  His  wisdom  and  splendor,  like  a  subtle  and  pierc¬ 
ing  fire,  insinuates  itself  eternally  with  resistless  force  through  every 
organized  atom,  and  that,  were  it  withdrawn  but  for  an  instant  from 
the  petal  of  the  meanest  flower,  gross  matter,  and  the  dead  chaos 
from  which  it  was  formed,  would  be  all  which  would  remain  of  its 
loveliness . 

“  Yes,”  she  went  on,  after  the  method  of  her  school,  who  preferred, 
like  most  decaying  ones,  harangues  to  dialectic,  and  synthesis  to  in¬ 
duction . “Look  at  yon  lotus-flower,  rising  like  Aphrodite  from 

the  wave  in  which  it  has  slept  throughout  the  night,  and  saluting, 
with  bending  swan-neck,  that  sun  which  it  will  follow  lovingly 
around  the  sky.  Is  there  no  more  there  than  brute  matter,  pipes  and 
fibers,  color  and  shape,  and  the  meaningless  life-in-death  which  men 
call  vegetation  ?  Those  old  Egyptian  priests  knew  better,  who 
could  see  in  the  number  and  the  form  of  those  ivory  petals  and 
golden  stamina,  in  that  mysterious  daily  birth  out  of  the  wave,  in  that 
nightly  baptism,  from  which  it  rises  each  morning  reborn  to  a  new 
life,  the  signs  of  some  divine  idea,  some  mysterious  law,  common  to 
the  flower  itself,  to  the  white-robed  priestess  who  held  it  in  the  tem¬ 
ple-rites,  and  to  the  goddess  to  whom  they  both  were  consecrated . 

The  flower  of  Isis  !. . .  .Ah— w^ell.  Nature  has  her  sad  symbols,  as 


170 


HYPATIA, 


well  as  her  fair  ones.  And  in  proportion  as  a  misguided  nation  has 
forgotten  the  worship  of  her  to  whom  they  owed  their  greatness,  for 
novel  and  barbaric  superstitions,  so  has  her  sacred  flower  grown  rarer 
and  more  rare,  till  now — fit  emblem  of  the  worship  over  which  it  used 
to  shed  its  perfume — it  is  only  to  be  found  in  gardens  such  as  these, — 
a  curiosity  to  the  vulgar,  and,  to  such  as  me,  a  lingering  monument 
©f  wisdom  and  of  glory  passed  away.” 

Philammon,  it  may  be  seen,  was  far  advanced  by  this  time  ;  for 
he  bore  the  allusions  to  Isis  without  the  slightest  shudder.  Nay,  he 
dared  even  to  offer  consolation  to  the  beautiful  mourner. 

•  “  The  philosopher,”  he*  said,  “  will  hardly  lament  the  loss  of  a 
mere  outward  idolatry.  For  f,  as  you  seem  to  think,  there  were  a 
root  of  spiritual  truth  in  the  symbolism  of  nature,  that  cannot  die. 
And  thus  the  lotus-flower  must  still  retain  its  meaning,  as  long  as  its 
species  exists  on  earth.” 

“  Idolatry  !  ”  answered  she  with  a  smile.  “  My  pupil  must  not  re¬ 
peat  to  me  that  worn-out  Christian  calumny.  Into  whatsoever  low 
superstitions  the  pious  vulgar  may  have  fallen,  it  is  the  Christians 
now,  and  not  the  heathens,  who  are  idolaters.  They  who  ascribe 
miraculous  power  to  dead  men’s  bones,  who  make  temples  of  charnel- 
houses,  and  bow  before  the  images  of  the  meanest  of  mankind,  have 
surely  no  right  to  accuse  of  idolatry  the  Greek  or  the  Egyptian, 
who  embodies  in  a  form  of  symbolic  beauty  ideas  beyond  the  reach 
of  words. 

“  Idolatry  ?  Do  I  worship  the  Pharos  when  I  gaze  at  it,  as  I  do  for 
hours,  with  loving  awe,  as  the  token  to  me  of  the  all-conquering 
might  of  Hellas  ?  Do  I  worship  the  roll  on  which  Homer’s  words 
are  written,  when  I  welcome  with  delight  the  celestial  truths  which 
it  unfolds  to  me,  and  even  prize  and  love  the  material  book  for  the 
sake  of  the  message  which  it  brings  ?  Do  you  fancy  that  any  but 
the  vulgar  worship  the  image  itself,  or  dream  that  it  can  help  or 
hear  them  ?  Does  the  lover  mistake  his  mistress’s  picture  for  the 
living,  speaking  reality  ?  We  worship  the  idea  of  which  the  image  is  a 
symbol.  Will  you  blame  us  because  we  use  that  symbol  to  represent 
the  idea  to  our  own  affections  and  emotions,  instead  of  leaving  it  a 
barren  notion,  a  vague  imagination  of  our  own  intellect?” 

“Then,”  asked  Philammon,  with  a  faltering  voice,  yet  unable  to 
restrain  his  curiosity,  “  then  you  do  reverence  the  heathen  gods  ?  ” 

Why  Hypatia  should  have  felt  this  question  a  sore  one,  puzzlod 
Philammon  ;  but  she  evidently  did  feel  it  as  such,  for  she  answered 
haughtily  enough, — 

“If  Cyril  had  asked  me  that  question,  I  should  have  disdained  to 
answer.  To  you  I  will  tell,  that  before  I  can  answer  your  question 
you  must  learn  what  those  whom  you  call  heathen  gods  are.  The 
vulgar,  or  rather  those  who  And  it  their  interest  to  calumniate  the 
vulgar  for  the  sake  of  confounding  philosophers  with  them,  may 
fancy  them  mere  human  beings,  subject  like  man  to  the  sufferings  of 


NEPIIELOCOCGUG  UlA. 


171 


pain  and  love,  to  tlie  limitations  of  personality.  We,  on  the  other 
hand,  have  been  taught  by  the  primeval  philosophers  of  Greece,  by 
the  priests  of  ancient  Egypt,  and  the  sages  of  Babylon,  to  recognize 
in  them  the  universal  powers  of  nature,  those  children  of  the  all- 
quickening  spirit,  which  are  but  various  emanations  of  the  one  pri¬ 
meval  unity, — say  rather,  various  phases  of  that  unity,  as  it  has  been 
variously  conceived,  according  to  the  differences  of  climate  and  race, 
by  the  Avise  of  different  nations.  And  thus,  in  our  eyes,  he  who 
reverences  the  many  worships  by  that  very  act,  with  the  highest 
and  fullest  adoration,  the  one  of  whose  perfection  they  are  the  partial 
antitypes  ;  perfect  each  in  themselves,  but  each  the  image  of  only 
one  of  its  perfections.” 

“Why,  then,”  said  Philammon,  much  relieved  by  this  explana¬ 
tion,  “do  you  so  dislike  Christianity?  May  it  not  be  one  of  the 
many  methods - ” 

“Because,”  she  answered,  interrupting  him  impatiently,  “  because 
it  denies  itself  to  be  one  of  those  many  methods,  and  stakes  its  exist¬ 
ence  on  the  denial ;  because  it  arrogates  to  itself  the  exclusive  reve¬ 
lation  of  the  Divine,  and  cannot  see,  in  its  self-conceit,  that  its  own 
doctrines  disprove  that  assumption  by  their  similarity  to  those  of  all 
creeds.  There  is  not  a  dogma  of  the  Galileans  which  may  not  be 
found,  under  some  form  or  other,  in  some  of  those  very  religions 
from  which  it  pretends  to  disdain  borrowing.’" 

“  Except,”  said  Theon,  “  its  exaltation  of  all  which  is  human  and 
low-born,  illiterate  and  leveling.” 

“Except  that -  But  look  !  here  comes  some  one  whom  I  cannot 

— do  not  choose  to  meet.  Turn  this  way, — quick  !  ” 

And  Hypatia,  turning  pale  as  death,  drew  her  father  with  unphil- 
osophic  haste  down  a  side  walk. 

“  Yes,”  she  went  on  to  herself,  as  soon  as  she  had  recovered  her 
equanimity.  “Were  this  Galilean  superstition  content  to  take  its 
place  humbly  among  the  other  ‘  religiones  licitas  ’  of  the  empire,  one 
might  tolerate  it  well  enough,  as  an  anthropomorphic  adumbration  of 
divine  things  fitted  for  the  base  and  toiling  herd  ;  perhaps  peculiarly 
fitted,  because  peculiarly  flattering  to  them.  But  now - ” 

“There  is  Miriam  again,”  said  Philammon,  “right  before  us  !” 

“  Miriam  ?  ”  asked  Hypatia,  severely.  “You  know  her  then  ?  How 
is  that  ?  ” 

“  She  lodges  at  Eudeemon’s  house,  as  I  do,”  answered  Philammon, 
frankly.  “  Not  that  I  ever  interchanged,  or  wish  to  interchange,  a 
word  with  so  base  a  creature.” 

‘  ‘  Do  not ;  I  charge  you  !  ”  said  Hypatia,  almost  imploringly.  But 
there  was  noAV  no  way  of  avoiding  her,  and  perforce  Hypatia  and  her 
tormentress  met  face  to  face. 

“One  word  !  one  moment,  beautiful  lady  I  ”  began  the  old  woman, 
with  a  slavish  obeisance.  “  Nay,  do  not  push  by  so  cruelly.  I  have 
— see  what  I  have  for  you  !  ”  and  she  held  out,  with  a  mysterious  air, 
“  The  Rainbow  of  Solomon,  ” 


173 


HYPATIA. 


Ah  !  I  knew  you  would  stop  a  moment,  not  for  the  ring’s  sake, 
of  course,  nor  even  for  the  sake  of  one  who  once  offered  it  to  you. 
Ah  !  and  where  is  he  now  ?  Dead  of  love,  perhaps  !  At  least  herels 

his  last  token  to  the  fairest  one,  the  cruel  one . Well,  perhaps 

she  is  right ....  To  be  an  empress, — an  empress  !. . .  .Far  finer  than 

anything  the  poor  Jew  could  have  offered . But  still ....  An 

empress  need  not  be  above  hearing  her  subject’s  petition.”  ... 

All  this  was  uttered  rapidly,  and  in  a  wheedling  undertone,  with  a 
continual  snaky  writhing  of  her  whole  body,  except  her  eye,  which 
seemed,  in  the  intense  fixity  of  its  glare,  to  act  as  a  fulcrum  for  all 
her  limbs  ;  and  from  that  eye,  as  long  as  it  kept  its  mysterious  hold, 
there  was  no  escaping. 

“  Wliat  do  you  mean ?  What  have  I  to  do  with  this  ring?  ”  asked 
Hypatia,  half-frightened. 

“  He  who  owned  it  once  offers  it  to  you  now.  You  recollect  a  little 

black  agate, — a  paltry  thing . If  you  have  not  thrown  it  away,  as 

you  most  likely  have,  he  wishes  to  redeem  it  with  this  opal , . . .  a 
gem  surely  more  fit  for  such  a  hand  as  that.” 

“  He  gave  me  the  agate,  and  I  shall  keep  it.” 

“But  this  opal, — worth,  O,  worth  ten  thousand  gold  pieces, — in 
exchange  for  that  paltry  broken  thing,  not  worth  one  ?  ” 

“I  am  not  a  dealer,  like  you,  and  have  not  yet  learned  to  value 
things  by  their  money  price.  If  that  agate  had  been  worth  money,  I 
would  never  have  accepted  it.” 

“  Take  the  ring,  take  it  my  darling,”  whispered  Theon,  impatiently  ; 
“it  will  pay  all  our  debts.” 

“  Ah,  that  it  will — pay  them  all,”  answered  the  old  woman,  who 
seemed  to  have  mysteriously  overheard  him. 

“  What? — my  father  !  Would  you,  too,  counsel  me  to  be  so  mer¬ 
cenary?  My  good  woman,”  she  went  on,  tnrning  to  Miriam,  “  I  can¬ 
not  expect  you  to  understand  the  reason  of  my  refusal.  You  and  I 
have  a  different  standard  of  worth.  But  for  the  sake  of  the  talisman 
engraved  on  that  agate,  if  for  no  other  reason,  I  cannot  give  it  up.” 

“  Ah  !  for  the  sake  of  the  talisman  !  That  is  wise,  now  !  That  is 
noble  !  Like  a  philosopher  !  O,  I  will  not  say  a  word  more.  Let 
the  beautiful  prophetess  keep  the  agate,  and  take  the  opal  too  ;  for 
see,  there  is  a  charm  on  it  also  !  The  name  by  which  Solomon  com¬ 
pelled  the  demons  to  do  his  bidding.  Look  !  What  might  you  not 
do,  now,  if  you  knew  how  to  use  that !  To  have  great  glorious 
angels,  with  six  wings  each,  bowing  at  your  feet  whensoever  you 
called  them,  and  saying,  ‘  Here  am  I,  mistress,  send  me.’  Only  look 
at  it !  ” 

Hypatia  took  the  tempting  bait,  and  examined  it  with  more  curi¬ 
osity  than  she  would  have  wished  to  confess  ;  while  the  old  woman 
W’ent  on  : — 

“  But  the  wise  lady  knows  how  to  use  the  black  agate,  of  course? 
Aben-Ezra  told  her  that,  did  he  not?  ” 


NEPEELOCOCCUO  UlA 


173 


Hypatia  blushed  somewhat  ;  she  was  ashamed  to  confess  that 
Aben-Ezra  had  not  revealed  the  secret  to  her,  probably  not  believing 
that  there  was  any,  and  that  the  talisman  had  been  to  her  only  a 
curious  plaything,  of  which  she  liked  to  believe  one  day  that  it  might 
possibly  have  some  occult  virtue,  and  the  next  day  to  laugh  at  the 
notion  as  unphilosophical  and  barbaric  ;  so  she  answered,  rather 
severely,  that  her  secrets  were  her  own  property. 

“Ah,  then  !  she  knows  it  all, — the  fortunate  lady  !  And  the  talis¬ 
man  has  told  her  whether*  Heraclian  has  lost  or  won  Rome  by  this 
timej  and  whether  she  is  to  be  the  mother  of  a  new  dynasty  of  Ptole¬ 
mies,  or  to  die  a  virgin,  which  the  Four  Angels  avert  !  And  surely 
she  has  had  the  great  daemon  come  to  her  already,  when  she  rubbed 
the  flat  side,  has  she  not  ?  ” 

“Go,  foolish  woman  ;  I  am  not  like  you,  the  dupe  of  childish 
superstitions.” 

“  Childish  superstitions  !  Ha  !  ha  !  ha  !  ”  said  the  old  woman,  as  she 
turned  to  go,  with  obeisances  more  lowly  than  ever.  “  And  she  has 
not  seen  the  Angels  yet  !. . . .  Ah  well  !  perhaps  some  day,  when  she 
wants  to  know  how  to  use  the  talisman,  the  beautiful  ladv  will  con- 
descend  to  let  the  poor  old  Jewess  show  her  the  way.” 

And  Miriam  disappeared  down  an  alley,  and  plunged  into  the 
thickest  shrubberies,  while  the  three  dreamers  went  on  their  way. 

Little  thought  Hypatia  that,  the  moment  the  old  woman  had 
found  herself  alone,  she  had  dashed  herself  down  on  the  turf,  rolling 
and  biting  at  the  leaves,  like  an  infuriated  wild  beast. ....  “  ~  will 
have  it  yet  I  I  will  have  it,  if  I  tear  out  her  heart  with  ' 


CHAPTER  XVI. 


VENUS  AND  PALLAS. 

As  Hypatia  was  passing  across  to  lier  lecture-room  that  afternoon,  slie 
was  stopped  midway  by  a  procession  of  some  twenty  Gotbs  and  dam¬ 
sels,  headed  by  Pelagia  herself,  in  all  her  glory  of  jewels,  shawls, 
and  snow-white  mule  ;  while  by  her  side  rode  the  Amal,  his  long 
legs,  like  those  of  Gang- Rolf  the  Norseman,  all  but  touching  the 
ground,  as  he  crushed  down  with  his  weight  a  delicate  little  barb, 
the  best  substitute  to  be  found  in  Alexandria  for  the  huge  black 
chargers  of  his  native  land. 

On  they  came,  followed  by  a  wondering  and  admiring  mob,  straight 
to  the  door  of  the  Museum,  and,  stopping,  began  to  dismount,  while 
their  slaves  took  charge  of  the  mules  and  horses. 

There  was  no  escape  for  Hypatia  ;  pride  forbade  her  to  follow  her 
own  maidenly  instinct,  and  to  recoil  anrong  the  crowd  behind  her  ; 
and  in  another  moment  the  Amal  had  lifted  Pelagia  from  her  mule, 
and  the  rival  beauties  of  Alexandria  stood,  for  the  first  time  in  their 
life,  face  to  face. 

“  May  Athene  befriend  you  this  day,  Hypatia  I  ”  said  Pelagia,  with 
her  sweetest  smile.  “  I  have  brought  in y  guards  to  hear  somew'hat 
of  your  wisdom,  this  afternoon.  I  am  anxious  to  know  whether  you 
can  teach  them  anything  more  worth  listening  to  than  the  foolish 
little  songs  which  Aphrodite  taught  me,  when  she  raised  me  from 
the  sea-foam,  as  she  rose  herself,  and  named  me  Pelagia.” 

Hypatia  drew  herself  up  to  her  stateliest  height,  and  returned  no 
answer. 

“  I  think  my  body-guard  will  well  bear  comparison  with  yours. 
At  least  they  are  princes,  and  the  descendants  of  deities.  So  it  is  but 
fitting  that  they  should  enter  before  your  provincial's.  Will  you 
show  them  the  way  ?  ” 

No  answer. 

“  Then  I  must  do  it  myself.  Come,  Amal !  ”  and  she  swept  up  the 
steps,  followed  by  the  Goths,  who  put  the  Alexandrians  aside  right 
and  left,  as  if  they  had  been  children. 

“  Ah  !  treacherous  wanton  that  you  are  !  ”  cried  a  young  man’s 
voice  out  of  the  murmuring  crowd.  “  After  having  plundered  us  of 
every  coin  out  of  which  you  could  dupe  us,  here  you  are  squandering 
our  patrimonies  on  barbarians  !  ” 

“  Give  us  back  our  presents,  Pelagia,”  cried  another,  “  and  you  are 
welcome  to  your  herd  of  wild  bulls  !  ”  '  - 

( t74 ) 


VENUS  AND  PALLAS. 


175 


“  And  I  will !”  cried  she,  stopping  suddenly  ,  and,  clutching  at  her 
chains  and  bracelets,  she  was  on  the  point  of  dashing  them  among 
the  astonished  crowd  ; — 

“  There  !  take  your  gifts  !  Pelagia  and  her  girls  scorn  to  be  debtors 
to  boys,  while  they  are  worshiped  by  men  like  these  !  ” 

But  the  Amal,  who,  luckily  for  the  students,  had  not  understood  a 
word  of  this  conversation,  seized  her  arm,  asking  if  she  were  mad. 

“No,  no!”  panted  she,  inarticulate  with  passion.  “  Give  me 
gold, — every  coin  you  have.  These  wretches  are  twitting  me  with 
what  they  gave  me  before — before — O  Amal,  you  understand  me  ?  ” 
And  she  clung  imploringly  to  his  arm. 

“  Oh  !  Heroes  !  each  of  you  throw  his  purse  among  these  fellows  I 
They  say  that  we  and  our  ladies  are  living  on  their  spoils.”  And  he 
tossed  his  purse  among  the  crowd. 

In  an  instant  every  Goth  had  followed  his  example  :  more  than 
one  following  it  up  by  dashing  a  bracelet  or  necklace  into  the  face  of 
some  hapless  philosophaster. 

“  I  have  no  lady,  my  young  friends,”  said  old  Wulf,  in  good  enough 
Greek,  “and  owe  you  nothing  ;  so  I  shall  keep  my  money,  as  you 
might  have  kept  yours  ;  and  as  you  might  too,  old  Smid,  if  you  had 
been  as  wise  as  I.” 

“  Don’t  be  stingy.  Prince,  for  the  honor  of  the  Goths,”  said  Smid, 
laughing. 

“If  I  take  in  gold,  I  pay  in  iron,”  answered  Wulf,  drawing  half 
out  of  its  sheath  the  huge  broad  blade,  at  the  ominous  brown  stains 
of  which  the  stndentry  recoiled  ;  and  the  whole  party  swept  into  the 
empty  lecture-room,  and  seated  themselves  at  their  ease  in  the  front 
ranks. 

Poor  Hypatia  I  at  first  she  determined  not  to  lecture, — then  to  send 
for  Orestes, — then  to  call  on  her  students  to  defend  the  sanctity  of 
the  Museum  ;  but  pride,  as  well  as  prudence,  advised  her  better ; 
to  retreat  would  be  to  confess  herself  conquered, — to  disgrace 
philosophy, — to  lose  her  hold  on  the  minds  of  all  waverers.  No  1  she 
would  go  on  and  brave  everything,  insults,  even  violence  ;  and  with 
trembling  limbs  and  a  pale  cheek  she  mounted  the  tribune  and 
began . 

To  her  surprise  and  delight,  however,  her  barbarian  auditors  were 
perfectly  well-beliaved.  Pelagia,  in  childish  good-humor  at  her 
triumph,  and  perhaps,  too,  determined  to  show  her  contempt  for  her 
adversary  by  giving  her  every  chance,  enforced  silence  and  attention, 
and  checked  the  tittering  of  the  girls,  for  a  full  half-hour.  But  at 
the  end  of  that  time  the  heavy  breathing  of  the  slumbering  Amal, 
who  had  been  twice  awoke  by  her,  resounded  unchecked  through 
the  lecture- room,  and  deepened  into  a  snore  ;  for  Pelagia  herself  was 
as  fast  asleep  as  he.  But  now  another  censor  took  upon  himself  the 
oflice  of  keeping  order.  Old  Wulf,  from  the  moment  Hypatia  had 
begun,  had  never  taken  his  eyes  off  her  face,  and  again  and  again  the 


176 


IITPATIA. 


maiden’s  weak  heart  had  been  cheered,  as  she  saw  the  smile  of  sturdy 
intelligence  and  honest  satisfaction  which  twinkled  over  that  scarred 
and  bristly  visage  ;  while  every  now  and  then  the  gray  beard  wagged 
approval,  until  she  found  herself,  long  before  the  end  of  the  oration, 
addressing  herself  straight  to  her  new  admirer. 

At  last  it  was  over,  and  the  students  behind,  who  had  sat  meekly 
through  it  all,  without  the  slightest  wish  to  “  upset”  the  intruders, 
who  had  so  thoroughly  upset  them,  rose  hurriedly,  glad  enough  to  get 
safe  out  of  so  dangerous  a  neighborhood.  But  to  their  astonishment, 
as  well  as  to  that  of  Hypatia,  old  Wulf  rose  also,  and,  stumbling 
along  to  the  foot  of  the  tribune,  pulled  out  his  purse  and  laid  it  at 
Hypatia’s  feet. 

“What  is  this? ’’asked  she,  half  terrified  at  the  approach  of  a 
figure  more  rugged  and  barbaric  than  she  bad  ever  beheld  before. 

“My  fee  for  what  I  have  heard  to-day.  You  are  a  right  noble 
maiden,  and  may  Freya  send  you  a  husband  worthy  of  you,  and  make 
you  the  mother  of  kings  !  ” 

And  Wulf  retired  with  his  party. 

Open  homage  to  her  rival,  before  her  very  face  !  Pelagia  felt 
quite  inclined  to  hate  old  Wulf. 

But  at  least  he  was  the  only  traitor.  The  rest  of  the  Goths  agreed 
unanimously  that  Hypatia  was  a  very  foolish  person,  who  was  wasting 
her  youth  and  beauty  in  talking  to  donkey-riders  ;  and  Pelagia  re¬ 
mounted,  her  mule,  and  the  Goths  their  horses,  for  a  triumphal  pro¬ 
cession  homeward. 

And  yet  her  heart  was  sad,  even  in  her  triumph.  Right  and  wrong 
were  ideas  as  unknown  to  her  as  they  were  to  hundreds  of  thousands 
in  her  day.  As  far  as  her  own  consciousness  was  concerned,  she  was 
as  destitute  of  a  soul  as  the  mule  on  which  she  rode.  Gifted  by  na¬ 
ture  with  boundless  frolic  and  good-humor,  wit  and  cunning,  her 
Greek  taste  for  the  physically  beautiful  and  graceful  developed  by 
long  training,  until  she  had  become  without  a  rival,  the  most  per¬ 
fect  pantomime,  dancer,  and  musician  who  catered  for  the  luxurious 
tastes  of  the  Alexandrian  theaters,  she  had  lived  since  her  childhood 
only  for  enjoyment  and  vanity,  and  wished  for  nothing  more.  But 
her  new  affection,  or  rather  worship,  for  the  huge  manhood  of  her 
Gothic  lover  had  awoke  in  her  a  new  object, — to  keep  him, — to  live 
for  him, — to  follow  him  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  even  if  he  tired  of 
her,  ill-used  her,  despised  her.  And  slowly,  day  by  day,  Wulf’s 
sneers  had  awakened  in  her  a  dread  that  perhaps  the  Amal  might 

despise  her . Why,  she  could  not  guess  :  but  what  sort  of  women 

were  those  Alrunas,  of  whom  Wulf  sung,  of  whom  even  Amal  and 
his  men  spoke  with  reverence,  as  something  nobler,  not  only  than 
her,  but  even  than  themselves?  And  what  was  it  which  Wulf  had 
recognized  in  Hypatia  which  had  bowed  the  stern  and  coarse  old 
warrior  before  her  in  that  public  homage  ! ....  It  was  not  difiBcult  to 
say  what...,.  But  why  should  that  make  Hypatia  or  any  one  else 


tmxis  AND  Pallas. 


Ill 

attractive  ?...  .And  the  poor  little* child  of  nature  gazed  in  deep  be¬ 
wilderment  at  the  crowd  of  new  questions,  as  a  butterfly  might  at 
the  pages  of  the  book  on  which  it  has  settled,  and  was  sad  and  dis¬ 
contented, — not  with  herself,  for  was  she  not  Pelagia  the  perfect? — 
but  with  these  strange  fancies  which  came  into  other  people’s  heads. 
Why  should  not  every  one  be  as  happy  as  they  could  ?  And  who 
knew  better  than  she  how  to  be  happy,  and  to  make  others  happy  ?.  . . . 

“  Look  at  that  old  monk  standing  on  the  pavement,  Amalric  !  Why 
does  he  stare  so  at  me  ?  Tell  him  to  go  away.” 

The  person  at  whom  she  pointed,  a  delicate-featured  old  man,  with 
a  venerable  white  beard,  seemed  to  hear  her  ;  for  he  turned  with  a 
sudden  start,  and  then,  to  Pelagia’s  astonishment,  put  his  hands  be¬ 
fore  his  face,  and  burst  convulsively  into  tears. 

“  What  does  he  mean  by  behaving  in  that  way?  Bring  him  here 
to  me  this  moment  !  I  will  know  !  ”  cried  she  petulantly,  catching  at 
the  new  object  in  order  to  escape  from  her  own  thoughts. 

In  a  moment  a  Goth  had  led  up  the  weeper,  who  came  without  de¬ 
mur  to  the  side  of  Pelagia’s  mule. 

“  Why  were  you  so  rude  as  to  burst  out  crying  in  my  face  ?  ”  asked 
she,  petulantly. 

The  old  man  looked  up  sadly  and  tenderly,  and  answered  in  a  low 
voice,  meant  only  for  her  ear, — 

“  And  how  can  I  help  weeping,  when  I  see  anything  as  beautiful 
as  you  are  destined  to  the  flames  of  hell  forever  ?  ” 

“The  flames  of  hell?”  said  Pelagia,  with  a  shudder.  “What 
for  ?  ” 

“  Do  you  not  know  ?”  asked  the  old  man  with  a  look  of  sad  sur¬ 
prise.  “  Have  you  forgotten  what  you  are?” 

“  I  ?  I  never  hurt  a  fly  !  ” 

“  Why  do  you  look  so  terrified,  my  darling?  What  have 
you  been  saying  to  her,  you  old  villian  ?  ”  and  the  Amal  raised  his 
whip. 

“  O,  do  not  strike  him  !  Come,  come  to-morrow,  and  tell  me  what 
you  mean.” 

“No,  we  will  have  no  monks  within  our  doors,  frightening  silly 
women.  Off,  sirrah  !  and  thank  the  lady  that  you  have  escaped 
with  a  whole  skin.”  And  the  Amal  caught  the  bridle  of  Pelagia’s 
mule,  and  pushed  forward,  leaving  the  old  man  gazing  sadly  after 
them. 

But  the  beautiful  sinner  was  evidently  not  the  object  which  had 
brought  the  old  monk  of  the  desert  into  a  neighborhood  so  strange 
and  ungenial  to  his  habits  ;  for,  recovering  himself  in  a  few  moments, 
he  hurried  on  to  the  door  of  the  Museum,  and  there  planted  himself, 
scanning  earnestly  the  faces  of  the  passers-out,  and  meeting,  of  course, 
with  his  due  share  of  student  ribaldry. 

“Well,  old  cat,  and  what  mouse  are  you  on  the  watch  for,  at  the 
hole’s  mouth  here  ?  ” 


1*78 


J^YPAI^IA. 


“Just  come  inside,  and  see  wlietlier  the  mice  will  not  singe  yotir- 
whiskers  for  you/’. . . . 

“  Here  is  my  mouse,  gentlemen,”  answered  the  old  monk,  with  a 
bow  and  a  smile,  as  he  laid  his  hand  on  Philamnion’s  arm  and  pre¬ 
sented  to  his  astonished  eyes  the  delicate  features  and  high,  retreat¬ 
ing  forehead  of  Arsenius. 

“  My  father  !  ”  cried  the  boy,  in  the  first  impulse  of  affectionate 
recognition  ;  and  then — he  had  expected  some  such  meeting  all 
along,  but,  now  that  it  was  come  at  last,  he  turned  pale  as  death. 
The  students  saw  his  emotion. 

“Hands  off,  old  Heautontimoroumenos  !  He  belongs  to  our  guild 
now  !  Monks  have  no  more  business  with  sons  than  with  wives. 
Shall  we  hustle  him  for  you,  Philammon  ?” 

“  Take  care  how  you  show  off,  gentlemen  ;  the  Goths  are  not  yet 
out  of  hearing  !  ”  answered  Philammon,  who  was  learning  fast  how 
to  give  a  smart  answer  ;  and  then,  fearing  the  temper  of  the  young 
dandies,  and  shrinking  from  the  notion  of  any  insult  to  one  so 
reverend  and  so  beloved  as  Arsenius,  he  drew  the  old  man  gently 
away,  and  walked  up  the  street  with  him  in  silence,  dreading  what 
was  coming. 

“And  are  these  your  friends?” 

“  Heaven  forbid  !  I  have  nothing  in  common  with  such  animals 
but  flesh  and  blood,  and  a  seat  in  the  lecture-room  !  ” 

“  Of  the  heathen  woman  ?  ” 

Philammon,  after  the  fashion  of  young  men  in  fear,  rushed  des¬ 
perately  into  the  subject  himself,  just  because  he  dreaded  Arsenius’s 
entering  on  it  quietly. 

“  Yes,  of  the  heathen  woman.  Of  course  you  have  seen  Cyril  be 
fore  you  came  hither?” 

“  I  have,  and - ” 

“  And,”  went  on  Philammon,  interrupting  him,  “you  have  been 
told  every  lie  which  prurience,  stupidity,  and  revenge  can  invent. 
That  I  have  trampled  on  the  cross, — sacrificed  to  all  the  deities  in  the 
pantheon, — and  probably” — (and  he  blushed  scarlet) — “that  that 
purest  and  holiest  of  beings, — who,  if  she  were  not  what  people  call  a 
pagan,  would  be,  and  deserves  to  be,  worshiped  as  the  queen  of 
saints, — that  she — and  I  ” — and  he  stopped. 

“Have  I  said  that  I  believed  what  1  may  have  heard  ? ” 

“No, — and  therefore,  as  they  are  all  simple  and  sheer  false¬ 
hoods,  there  is  no  more  to  be  said  on  the  subject.  Not  that  1  shall 
not  be  delighted  to  answer  any  questions  of  yours,  my  dearest 
father - ” 

“  Have  I  asked  any,  my  child  ?  ” 

“No.  So  we  may  as  well  change  the  subject  for  the  present,” — 
and  he  began  overwhelming  the  old  man  with  inquiries  about  him¬ 
self,  Pambo,  and  each  and  all  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  Laura  :  to 
which  Arsenius,  to  the  boy’s  infinite  relief,  answered  cordially  and 


A 


0 


Venus  and  Dallas. 

minutely,  and  even  voiiclisafed  a  smile  at  some  jest  of  Pliilammon’s 
on  tlie  contrast  between  tlie  monks  of  Nitria  and  those  of  Scetis. 

Arsenins  was  too  wise  not  to  see  well  enough  what  all  this  flippancy 
meant,  and  too  wise,  also,  not  to  know  that  Philammon’s  version  was 
probably  quite  as  near  the  truth  as  Peter’s  and  Cyril’s  ;  but  for  reasons 
of  his  own,  merely  replied  by  an  affectionate  look,  and  a  compliment 
to  Philammon’s  growth. 

“  And  yet  you  seem  thin  and  pale,  my  boy,” 

“  Study,”  said  Philammon,  “  study.  One  cannot  burn  the  midnight 
oil  without  paying  some  penalty  for  it . However,  I  am  richly  re¬ 

paid  already  ;  I  shall  be  more  so  hereafter.” 

“  Let  us  hope  so.  But  who  are  those  Goths  whom  I  passed  in  the 
streets  just  now  ?  ” 

“  Ah  !  my  father,”  said  Philammon,  glad  in  his  heart  of  any  excuse 
to  turn  the  conversation,  and  yet  half  uneasy  and  suspicious  at  Ar¬ 
seni  us’s  evident  determination  to  avoid  the  very  object  of  his  visit. 

It  must  have  been  you,  then,  whom  I  saw  stop  and  speak  with  Pela¬ 
gia  at  the  farther  end  of  the  street.  What  words  could  you  possibly 
have  had  wherewith  to  honor  such  a  creature  ?  ” 

‘‘  God  knows.  Some  secret  sympathy  touched  my  heart . Alas  ! 

poor  child  !  But  how  come  you  to  know  her  ?  ” 

“  All  Alexandria  knows  the  shameless  abomination,”  interrupted  a 
voice  at  their  elbow, — none  other  than  that  of  the  little  porter,  who 
had  been  dogging  and  watching  the  pair  the  whole  way,  and  could  no 
longer  restrain  his  longing  to  meddle,  “And  well  had  it  been  for 
many  a  rich  young  man  had  old  Miriam  never  brought  her  over,  in 
an  evil  day,  from  Athens  hither.” 

“  Miriam  ?  ” 

“  Yes,  monk  ;  a  name  not  unknown,  I  am  told,  in  palaces  as  well 
as  in  slave-markets.” 

“  An  evil-eyed  old  Jewess  ?  ” 

“  A  Jewess  she  is,  as  her  name  might  have  informed  you, — and  as 
for  her  eyes,  I  consider  them,  or  used  to  do  so,  of  course, — for  her 
injured  nation  have  been  long  expelled  from  Alexandria  by  your 
fanatic  tribe, — as  altogether  divine  and  demoniac,  let  the  base  im¬ 
agination  of  monks  call  them  what  it  likes.” 

“  But  how  did  you  know  this  Pelagia,  my  son  ?  She  is  no  fit  com¬ 
pany  for  such  as  you.” 

Philammon  told,  honestly  enough,  the  story  of  his  Nile  journey 
and  Pelagia’s  invitation  to  him. 

“You  did  not  surely  accept  it?’ 

“  Heaven  forbid  that  Hypatia’s  scholar  should  so  degrade  himself 

Arsenius  shook  his  head  sadly. 

“  You  would  not  have  had  me  go  ?  ” 

“No,  boy.  But  how  long  hast  thou  learned  to  call  thyself  Hy¬ 
patia’s  scholar,  or  to  call  it  a  degradation  to  visit  the  most  sinful,  if 
thou  mightest  thereby  bring  back  a  lost  lamb  to  the  Good  Shepherd  ? 


nrPATtA 


lao 

Nevertheless,  thou  art  too  young  for  such  employment, — and  she 
meant  to  tempt  thee,  doubtless.” 

“  I  do  not  think  it.  She  seemed  struck  by  my  talking  Athenian 
dreek,  and  having  come  from  Athens.” 

f  “  And  how  long  since  she  came  from  Athens  ?  ”  said  Arsenius,  after 
a  pause.  “Who  knows?” 

“  Just  after  it  was  sacked  by  the  barbarians,”  said  the  little  porter, 
who,  beginning  to  suspect  a  mystery,  was  peeking  and  peering  like 
an  excited  parrot.  “The  old  dame  brought  her  hither,  among  a 
cargo  of  captive  boys  and  girls.” 

“  The  time  agrees . Can  this  Miriam  be  found?” 

“  A  sapient  and  courteous  question  for  a  monk  to  ask  !  Do  you 
not  know  that  Cyril  has  expelled  all  Jews  four  months  ago?” 

“True,  true . Alas  !  ”  said  the  old  man  to  himself,  “  how  little 

the  rulers  of  this  world  guess  their  own  power  !  They  nmve  a  finger 
carelessly,  and  forget  that  that  finger  may  crush  to  death  hundreds 
whose  names  they  never  heard, — and  every  soul  of  them  as  precious 
in  God’s  sight  as  Cyril’s  own.” 

“What  is  the  matter,  my  father?”  asked  Philammon.  “You 
seem  deeply  moved  about  this  woman.”. . . . 

“  And  she  is  Miriam’s  slave?” 

“Her  freedwoman  this  four  years  past,”  said  the  porter.  “The 
good  lady — for  reasons  doubtless  excellent  in  themselves,  though  not 
altogether  patent  to  the  philosophic  mind — thought  good  to  turn  her 
loose  on  the  Alexandrian  republic  to  seek  what  she  might  devour.” 

“  God  help  her  !  And  you  are  certain  that  Miriam  is  not  in  Alex¬ 
andria  ?  ” 

The  little  porter  turned  very  red,  and  Philammon  did  so  likewise  ; 
but  he  remembered  his  promise,  and  kept  it. 

“  You  both  know  something  of  her,  I  can  see.  You  cannot  deceive 
an  old  statesman,  sir  !  ” — turning  to  the  little  porter  with  a  look  of 
authority, — “  poor  monk  though  he  be  now.  If  you  think  fitting  to 
tell  me  what  you  know,  I  promise  you  that  neither  she  nor  you  shall 
be  losers  by  your  confidence  in  me.  If  not,  I  shall  find  means  to 
discover.” 

Both  stood  silent. 

“  Philammon,  my  son  !  and  art  thou,  too,  in  league  against- — no, 
not  against  me  ;  against  thyself,  poor,  misguided  boy  ?  ” 

“Against  myself?” 

“  Yes, — I  have  said  it.  But  unless  you  will  trust  me,  I  cannot 
trust  you.” 

“  I  have  promised.” 

“And  I,  sir  statesman,  or  monk,  or  both,  or  neither,  have  sworn 
by  the  immortal  gods  !  ”  said  the  porter,  looking  very  big. 

Arsenius  paused. 

“  There  are  those  who  hold  that  an  oath  by  an  idol,  being  nothing, 
is  of  itself  void.  I  do  not  agree  with  them.  If  thou  thinkest  it 


V^ns  AND  PALLAS. 


sin  to  break  tbine  oatb,  to  tliee  it  is  sin.  And  for  tbee,  my  poor 
child,  thy  promise  is  sacred,  were  it  made  to  Iscariot  himself.  But 
hear  me.  Can  either  of  you,  by  asking  this  woman,  be  so  far  absolved 
as  to  give  me  speech  of  her  ?  Tell  her — that  is,  if  she  be  in  Alexan¬ 
dria,  which  God  grant — all  that  has  passed  between  us  here,  and  tell 
her  on  the  solemn  oath  of  a  Christian,  that  Arsenius,  whose  name 
she  knows  well,  will  neither  injure  nor  betray  her.  Will  you  do 
this  !  ” 

“Arsenius  !  ”  cried  the  little  porter,  with  a  look  of  mingled  awe 
and  pity. , 

The  old  man  smiled.  “Arsenius,  who  was  once  called  the  Father 
of  the  Fiinperors.  Even  she  will  trust  that  name.” 

“  I  will  go  this  moment,  sir  ;  I  will  hy  !  ”  and  off  rushed  the  little 
porter. 

“  The  little  fellow  forgets,”  said  Arsenius  with  a  smile,  “to  how 
much  he  has  confessed  already,  and  how  easy  it  were  now  to  trace 

him  to  the  old  hag’s  lair . Philammon,  my  son. . .  .1  have  many 

tears  to  weep  over  thee, — but  they  must  wait  a  while.  I  have  thee 
safe  now,”  and  the  old  man  clutched  his  arm.  “  Thou  wilt  not 
leave  thy  poor  old  father  ?  Thou  wilt  not  desert  me  for  the  heathen 
woman  ?  ” 

“I  will  stay  with  you,  I  promise  you,  indeed  !  if — if  you  will  not 
say  unjust  things  of  her.” 

“  I  will  speak  evil  of  no  one,  accuse  no  one,  but  myself.  I  will 
not  say  one  harsh  word  to  thee,  my  poor  boy.  But  listen  now  !  Thou 
knowest  that  thou  earnest  from  Athens.  Knowest  thou  that  it  was  I 
who  brought  thee  hither  ?  ” 

“You?” 

‘  ‘  I,  my  son  :  but  when  I  brought  thee  to  the  Laura,  it  seemed 
right  that  thou,  as  the  son  of  a  noble  gentleman,  shouldst  hear  noth¬ 
ing  of  it.  But  tell  me  :  dost  thou  recollect  father  or  mother,  brother 
or  sister  ;  or  anything  of  thy  home  in  Athens  ?  ” 

“No  !” 

“  Thanks’ be  to  God.  But,  Philammon,  if  thou  hadst  had  a  sister — 
hush  !  And  if — I  only  say  if - ” 

“  A  sister  !  ”  interrupted  Philammon.  “  Pelagia  ?  ” 

“  God  forbid,  my  son  !  But  a  sister  thou  hadst  once, — some  three 
years  older  than  thee,  she  seemed.” 

“  What  ?  Did  you  know  her  ?  ” 

“  I  saw  her  but  once, — on  one  sad  day.  Poor  children  both  1  I 
will  not  sadden  you  by  telling  you  where  and  how  ?  ” 

“  And  why  did  you  not  bring  her  hither  with  me?  You  surely  had 
not  the  heart  to  part  us  ?  ” 

“Ah,  my  son,  what  right  had  an  old  monk  with  a  fair  young  girl  ? 
And,  indeed,  even  had  I  had  the  courage,  it  would  have  been  impos¬ 
sible.  There  were  others,  richer  than  I,  to  whose  covetousness  her 
youth  and  beauty  seemed  a  precious  prize.  When  I  saw  her  last, 


18^ 


Mtpatta. 

she  was  in  company  with  an  ancient  Jewess.  Heaven  grant  that  this 
Miriam  may  prove  to  be  the  one.” 

“And  I  have  a  sister!”  gasped  Philammon,  with  eyes  bursting 
with  tears.  “  We  must  find  her  1  You  will  help  me? — Now — this 
moment  1  There  is  nothing  else  to  be  thought  of,  done,  henceforth, 
till  she  is  found  I  ” 

“Ah,  my  son,  my  son  I  Better,  better,  perhaps  to  leave  her  in  the 
hands  of  God  1  What  if  she  were  dead?  To  discover  that  would 
be  to  discover  needless  sorrow.  And  what  if — God  grant  that  it  be 
not  so  ! — she  had  only  a  name  to  live,  and  were  dead,  worse  than 
dead,  in  sinful  pleasure  ? - ” 

“We  would  save  her,  or  die  trying  to  save  her  !  Is  it  not  enough 
for  me  that  she  is  my  sister?” 

Arsenius  shook  his  head.  He  little  knew  the  strange  new  light 
and  warmth  which  his  words  had  poured  in  upon  the  young  heart 

beside  him . “A  sister  !”  What  mysterious  virtue  was  there  in 

that  simple  word,  which  made  Philamnion’s  brain  reel  and  his  heart 
throb  madly  ?  A  sister  I  not  merely  a  friend,  an  equal,  a  helpmate, 
given  by  God  himself,  for  loving  whom  none,  not  even  a  monk, 
could  blame  him. — Not  merely  something  delicate,  weak,  beautiful, 
— for  of  course  she  must  be  beautiful, — whom  he  might  cherish, 
guide,  support,  deliver,  die  for,  and  find  death  delicious.  Yes, — all 
that,  and  more  than  that,  lay  in  the  sacred  word.  For  those  divided 
and  partial  notions  had  flitted  across  his  mind  too  rapidly  to  stir  such 
passion  as  moved  him  now;  even  the  hint  of  her  sin  and  danger  had 
been  heard  heedlessly,  if  heard  at  all.  It  was  the  word  itself  which 
bore  its  own  message,  its  own  spell,  to  the  heart  of  the  fatherless 
and  motherless  foundling,  as  he  faced  for  the  first  time  the  deep, 

everlasting,  divine  reality  of  kindred . A  sister  !  of  his  own  flesh 

and  blood, — born  of  the  same  father,  the  same  mother, — his,  his, 
forever  1  How  hollow  and  fleeting  seemed  all  ‘  ‘  spiritual  sonships,” 
“  spiritual  daughterhoods,”  inventions  of  the  changing  fancy,  the 
wayward  will  of  man.  Arsenius — Pambo — ay,  Hypatia,  herself, — ■ 
what  were  they  to  him  now  ?  Here  was  a  real  relationship.  A  sis¬ 
ter  !  What  else  was  worth  caring  for  upon  earth  ? 

“  And  she  was  at  Athens  when  Pelagia  was,” — he  cried  at  last, — 
“  perhaps  knew  her  ; — let  us  go  to  Pelagia  herself  !  ” 

“Heaven  forbid  I”  said  Arsenius.  “We  must  wait  at  least  till 
Miriam’s  answer  comes.” 

“  I  can  show  you  her  house,  at  least,  in  the  mean  while  ;  and  you 
can  go  in  yourself  when  you  will.  I  do  not  ask  to  enter.  Come  1 
I  feel  certain  that  my  finding  her  is  in  some  way  bound  up  with 
Pelagia.  Had  I  not  met  her  on  the  Nile,  had  you  not  met  her  in 
the  street,  I  might  never  have  heard  that  I  had  a  sister.  And  if  she 
went  with  Miriam,  Pelagia  must  know  her, — she  may  be  in  that  very 
house  at  this  moment  I  ” 

Arsenius  had  his  reasons  for  suspecting  that  Philammon  was  but 


vmu8  Ai^D  PALLAS. 


183 


too  right.  But  he  contented  himself  with  yielding  to  the  boy’s  ex¬ 
citement,  and  set  off  with  him  in  the  direction  of  the  dancer’s  house. 

They  were  within  a  few  yards  of  the  gate,  when  hurried  footsteps 
behind  them,  and  voices  calling  them  by  name,  made  them  turn  ; 
and  behold,  evidently  to  the  disgust  of  Arsenins,  as  much  as  Pliil- 
ammon  himself,  Peter  the  Reader  and  a  large  party  of  monks  ! 

Philammon’s  first  impulse  was  to  escape  :  Arsenius  himself  caught 
him  by  the  arm,  and  seemed  inclined  to  hurry  on. 

No  !”  thought  the  youth,  ‘'am  I  not  a  free  man  and  a  phil¬ 
osopher?”  and,  facing  round,  he  awaited  the  enemy. 

“  Ah,  young  apostate  !  So  you  have  found  him,  reverend  and  ill- 
used  sir.  Praised  be  Heaven  for  this  rapid  success  !  ” 

“  My  good  friend,”  asked  Arsenius,  in  a  trembling  voice,  “what 
brings  you  here  ?” 

“  Heaven  forbid  that  I  should  have  allowed  your  sanctity  and  age 
to  go  forth,  without  some  guard  against  the  insults  and  violence  of 
this  wretched  youth  and  his  profligate  companions.  We  have  been 
following  you  afar  off  all  the  morning,  with  hearts  full  of  filial 
solicitude.” 

“  Many  thanks  ;  but  indeed  your  kindness  has  been  superfluous. 
My  son  here,  from  whom  I  have  met  with  nothing  but  affection,  and 
whom,  indeed,  I  believe  far  more  innocent  than  report  declared  him, 
is  about  to  return  peaceably  with  me.  Are  you  not,  Philammon?” 

“  Alas  !  my  father,”  said  Philammon,  with  an  effort,  “  how  can  1 
find  courage  to  say  it  ? — but  I  cannot  return  with  you.” 

“  Cannot  return  ?  ” 

“  I  vowed  that  I  would  never  again  cross  that  threshold  till - ” 

“  And  Cyril  does.  He  bade  me,  indeed  he  bade  me,  assure  yoa 
that  he  would  receive  you  back  as  a  son,  and  forgive  and  forget  all 
the  past.” 

“Forgive  and  forget?  That  is  my  part, — not  his.  Will  he  right 
me  against  that  tyrant  and  his  crew  ?  Will  he  proclaim  me  openly 
to  be  an  innocent  and  persecuted  man,  unjustly  beaten  and  driven  forth 
for  obeying  his  own  commands  ?  Till  he  does  that,  I  shall  not  forget 
that  I  am  a  free  man.” 

“  A  free  man  ?”  said  Peter,  with  an  unpleasant  smile  ;  “  that  re¬ 
mains  to  be  proved,  my  gay  youth  ;  and  will  need  more  evidence  than 
that  smart  philosopliic  cloak  and  those  well-curled  locks  which  you 
liave  adopted  since  I  saw  you  last.” 

“  Remains  to  be  proved  ?  ” 

Arsenius  made  an  imploring  gesture  to  Peter  to  be  silent. 

“  Nay  sir.  As  I  foretold  to  you,  this  one  way  alone  remains  ;  the 
blame  of  it,  if  there  be  blame,  must  rest  on  the  unhappy  youth 
whose  perversity  renders  it  necessary.” 

“  For  God’s  sake,  spare  me  !  ”  cried  the  old  man,  dragging  Peter 
aside,  while  Philammon  stood  astonished,  divided  between  indigna¬ 
tion  and  vague  dread. 


184 


ETPATIA. 


“  Did  I  not  tell  you  again  and  again  tliat  I  never  could  bring  my¬ 
self  to  call  a  Christian  man  my  slave?  And  him,  above  all,  my 
spiritual  son  ?  ” 

“  And  most  reverend  sir,  whose  zeal  is  only  surpassed  by  your  ten¬ 
derness  and  mercy,  did  not  the  holy  patriarch  assure  you  that  your 
scruples  were  groundless  ?  Do  you  think  that  either  he  or  I  can  have 
less  horror  than  you  have  of  slavery  in  itself  ?  Heaven  forbid  ! 
But  when  an  immortal  soul  is  at  stake, — when  a  lost  lamb  is  to  be 
brought  back  to  the  fold, — surely  you  may  employ  the  authority 
which  the  law  gives  you  for  the  salvation  of  that  precious  charge 
committed  .to  you  !  What  could  be  more  conclusive  than  his  holi¬ 
ness’s  argument  this  morning  ?  ‘  Christians  are  bound  to  obey  the 

laws  of  this  world  for  conscience’s  sake,  even  though,  in  the  abstract, 
they  may  disapprove  of  them,  and  deny  their  authority.  Then,  by 
parity  of  reasoning,  it  must  be  lawful  for  them  to  take  the  advantage 
which  'those  same  laws  offer  them,  when  by  so  doing  the  glory  of 
God  may  be  advanced.’  ” 

Arsenins  still  hung  back,  with  eyes  brimming  with  tears  ;  but 
Philammon  himself  put  an  end  to  the  parley. 

“  What  is  the  meaning  of  all  this?  Are  you,  too,  in  a  conspiracy 
^against  me  ?  Speak,  Arsenins  !  ” 

“  This  is  the  meaning  of  it,  blinded  sinner  !  ”  cried  Peter.  “  That 
you  are  by  law  the  slave  of  Arsenins,  lawfully  bought  with  his  money 
in  the  city  of  Bavenna  ;  and  that  he  has  the  power,  and,  as  I  trust, 
for  the  sake  of  your  salvation,  the  will  also,  to  compel  you  to  ac¬ 
company  him  !  ” 

Philammon  recoiled  across  the  pavement,  and  with  eyes  flashing 

defiance.  A  slave  !  The  light  of  heaven  grew  black  to  him . O 

that  Hypatia  might  never  know  his  shame  !  Yet  it  was  impossible. 
Too  dreadful  to  be  true . 

“  You  lie  !  ”  almost  shrieked  he.  “  I  am  the  son  of  a  noble  citizen 
of  Athens.  Arsenins  told  me  so,  but  this  moment,  with  his  own 
lips  !  ” 

“  Ay,  but  he  bought  you, — bought  you  in  the  public  market  ;  and 
he  can  prove  it  !  ” 

'‘Hear  me, — hear  me,  my  son!”  cried  the  old  man,  springing 
toward  him.  Philammon  in  his  fury  mistook  the  gesture,  and 
thrust  him  fiercely  back. 

“Your  son? — your  slave  I  Do  not  insult  the  name  of  son  by  ap¬ 
plying  it  to  me.  Yes,  sir  ;  your  slave  in  body,  but  not  in  soul  I  Ay, 
seizeme, — drag  home  the  fugitive, — scourge  him, — brand  him,  chain 
him  in  the  mill,  if  you  can  ;  but  even  for  that  the  free  heart  has  a  rem¬ 
edy.  If  you  will  not  let  me  live  as  a  philosopher,  you  shall  see  me  die 
like  one  I  ” 

“  Seize  the  felloAv,  my  brethren  !  ”  cried  Peter,  while  Arsenins, 
utterly  unable  to  restrain  either  party,  hid  his  face  and  wept. 

“Wretches!”  cried  the  boy;  “you  shall  never  take  me  alive, 


VENUS  AND  PALLAS,  185 

while  I  have  teeth  or  nails  left.  Treat  me  as  a  brute  oeast,  and  I 
will  defend  myself  as  such  !  ” 

“  Out  of  the  way  there,  rascals  !  Place  for  the  pref^t  !  What 
are  you  squabbling  about  here,  yoii  unmannerly  monks?”  shouted 
peremptory  voices  from  behind.  The  crowd  parted,  and  disclosed 
the  apparitors  of  Orestes,  who  followed  in  his  robes  of  office. 

A  sudden  hope  flashed  before  Philammon,  and  in  an  instant  he 
had  burst  through  the  mob,  and  was  clinging  to  the  prefect’s 
chariot. 

“  I  am  a  free-born  Athenian,  whom  these  monks  wish  to  kidnap 
back  into  slavery  !  I  claim  your  protection  !  ” 

“  And  you  shall  have  it,  right  or  wrong,  my  handsome  fellow.  By 
Heaven,  you  are  much  too  good-looking  to  be  made  a  monk  of  !  What 
do  you  mean,  you  villains,  by  attempting  to  kidnap  free  men  ?  Is  it 
not  enough  for  you  to  lock  up  every  mad  girl  whom  you  can  dupe, 
but  you  must - ” 

“  His  master  is  here  present,  your  excellency,  who  will  swear  to 
the  purchase.” 

“  Or  to  anything  else  for  the  glory  of  God.  Out  of  the  way  !  And 
take  care,  you  tall  scoundrel,  that  I  do  not  get  a  handle  against  you. 
You  have  been  one  of  my  marked  men  for  many  a  month.  Off  !  ” 

“  His  master  demands  the  rights  of  the  law  as  a  iioman  citizen,” 
said  Peter,  pushing  forward  Arsenius. 

“  If  he  be  a  Roman  citizen,  let  him  come  and  make  his  claim  at 
the  tribune  to-morrow,  in  legal  form.  But  I  would  have  you 
remember,  ancient  sir,  that  I  shall  require  you  to  prove  your  citizen¬ 
ship,  before  we  proceed  to  the  question  of  purchase.” 

“  The  law  does  not  demand  that,”  quoth  Peter. 

^nock  that  fellow  down,  apparitor  !  ”  Whereat  Peter  vanished, 
and  an  ominous  growl  rose  from  the  mob  of  monks. 

“  What  am  I  to  do,  most  noble  sir?”  said  Philammon. 

“  Whatever  you  like,  till  the  third  hour  to-morrow, — if  you  are 
fool  enough  to  appear  at  the  tribune.  If  you  will  take  my  advice, 
you  will  knock  down  these  fellows  right  and  left,  and  run  for  your 
life.”  And  Orestes  drove  on. 

Philammon  saw  that  it  was  his  only  chance,  and  did  so  ;  and  in 
another  minute  he  found  himself  rushing  headlong  into  the  archway 
of  Pelagia’s  house,  with  a  dozen  monks  at  his  heels. 

As  luck  would  have  it,  the  outer  gates,  at  which  the  Goths  had 
just  entered,  were  still  open  ;  but  the  inner  ones  which  led  into  the 
court  beyond  were  fast.  He  tried  them,  but  in  vain.  There  vvas  an 
open  door  in  the  wall  on  his  right  ;  he  rushed  through  it,  into  a  long 
range  of  stables,  and  into  the  arms  of  Wulf  and  Smid,  who  were 
unsaddling  and  feeding,  like  true  warriors,  their  own  horses. 

“  Souls  of  my  fathers  !”  shouted  Smid,  “  here’s  our  young  monk 
come  back  !  What  brings  you  here  head  over  heels  in  this  way, 
young  curly-pate  ?  ” 


186 


HYPATIA. 


“Save  me  from  those  wretches!”  pointing  to  the  monks,  who 
were  peeping  into  the  doorway. 

Wulf  seemed  to  understand  it  all  in  a  moment ;  for,  snatching  up 
a  heavy  whip,  he  rushed  at  the  foe,  and  with  a  few  tremendous  strokes 
cleared  the  doorway,  and  shut  to  the  door. 

Philammon  was  going  to  explain  and  thank,  hut  Smid  stopped  his 
mouth. 

“  Never  mind,  young  one,  you  are  our  guest  now.  Come  in,  and 
you  shall  he  as  welcome  as  ever.  See  what  comes  of  running  away 
from  us  at  first.” 

“  You  do  not  seem  to  have  benefited  much  by  leaving  me  for  the 
monks,”  said  old  Wulf.  “  Come  in  by  the  inner  door,  Smid  !  go  and 
turn  those  monks  out  of  the  gateway.  ” 

But  the  mob,  after  battering  the  door  for  a  few  minutes,  had 
yielded  to  the  agonized  entreaties  of  Peter,  who  assured  them  that,  if 
those  incarnate  fiends  once  broke  out  upon  them,  they  would  not 
leave  a  Christian  alive  in  Alexandria.  So  it  was  agreed  to  leave  a 
few  to  watch  for  Philammon’s  coming  out  ;  and  the  rest,  balked  of 
their  prey,  turned  the  tide  of  their  wrath  against  the  prefect,  and 
rejoined  the  mass  of  their  party,  who  were  still  hanging  round  his 
chariot,  ready  for  mischief. 

In  vain  the  hapless  shepherd  of  the  people  attempted  to  drive  on. 
The  apparitors  were  frightened,  and  hung  back  ;  and  without  their 
help  it  was  impossible  to  force  the  horses  through  the  mass  of 
tossing  arms  and  beards  in  front.  The  matter  was  evidently  growing 
serious. 

“  The  bitterest  ruffians  in  all  Nitria,  your  excellency,”  whispered 
one  of  the  guards,  with  a  pale  face  ;  “and  two  hundred  of  them  at 
the  least.  The  very  same  set,  I  will  be  sworn,  who  nearly  murdered 
Dioscuros.” 

“If  you  will  not  allow  me  to  proceed,  my  holy  brethren,”  said 
Orestes,  trying  to  look  collected,  “  perhaps  it  will  not  be  contrary  to 
the  canons  of  the  Church  if  I  turn  back.  Leave  the  horses’  heads 
^ilone.  Why,  in  God’s  name,  what  do  you  want  ?  ” 

“  Do  you  fancy  we  have  forgotten  Hieracas  1  ”  cried  a  voice  from 
the  rear  ;  and  at  that  name,  yell  upon  yell  arose,  till  the  mob, 
gaining  courage  from  its  own  noise,  burst  out  into  open  threats. 
“Revenge  for  the  blessed  martyr,  Hieracas  I”  “Revenge  for  the 
wrongs  of  the  Church  1  ”  “  Down  with  the  friend  of  Heathens, 

Jews,  and  Barbarians  1”  “Down  with  the  favorite  of  Hypatia!” 
‘  ‘  Tyrant  !  ”  “  Butcher  !  ” 

And  the  last  epithet  so  smote  the  delicate  fancy  of  the  crowd,  that 
a  general  cry  arose  of  “  Kill  the  butcher  !  ”  and  one  furious  monk 
attempted  to  clamber  into  the  chariot.  An  apparitor  tore  him  down, 
and  was  dragged  to  the  ground  in  his  turn.  The  monks  closed  in. 
The  guards,  finding  the  enemy  number  ten  to  their  one,  threw  down 
their  weapons  in  a  panic,  and  vanished  ;  and  in  another  minute  the 


VENUS  AND  PALLAS. 


isn 

hopes  of  Hypatia  and  the  gods  would  have  been  lost  forever,  and 
Alexandria  robbed  of  the  blessing  of  being  ruled  by  the  most  finished 
gentleman  south  of  the  Mediterranean,  had  it  not  been  for  unex¬ 
pected  succor  of  which  it  \yill  be  time  enough,  considering  who  and 
what  is  in  danger,  to  speak  in  a  future  chapter. 


CHAPTER  XVII. 


A  STRAY  GLEAM. 

The  last  bine  beadland  of  Sardinia  was  fading  fast  on  the  north¬ 
west  horizon,  and  a  steady  breeze  bore  before  it  innumerable  ships, 
the  wrecks  of  Heraclian’s  armament,  plunging  and  tossing  impatiently 
in  their  desperate  homeward  race  toward  the  coast  of  Africa,  Far 
and  wide,  under  a  sky  of  cloudless  blue,  the  white  sails  glittered  on 
the  glittering  sea,  as  gayly  now,  above  their  loads  of  shame  and  dis¬ 
appointment,  terror  and  pain,  as  when,  but  one  short  month  before, 
they  bore  with  them  only  wild  hopes  and  gallant  daring.  And  who 
can  calculate  the  sum  of  misery  in  that  hapless  flight?. . .  .And  yet  it 
was  but  one,  and  that  one  of  the  least  known  and  most  trivial,  of  the 
tragedies  of  that  age  of  woe  ;  one  petty  death-spasm  among  the  un¬ 
numbered  throes  which  were  shaking  to  dissolution  the  Babylon  of 

the  West,  Her  time  had  come . Even  as  Saint  John  beheld  her  in 

his  vision,  by  agony  after  agony,  she  was  rotting  to  her  well-earned 
doom.  Tyrannizing  it  luxuriously  over  all  nations,  she  had  sat  upon 
the  mystic  beast, — building  her  power  on  the  brute  animal  appetites  of 
her  dupes  and  slaves  :  but  she  had  duped  herself  even  more  than  them. 
She  was  finding  out  by  bitter  lessons  that  it  was  “  to  the  beast,”  and 
not  to  her,  that  her  vassal  kings  of  the  earth  had  been  giving  their 
power  and  strength  ;  and  the  ferocity  and  lust  which  she  had  pam¬ 
pered  so  cunningly  in  them,  had  become  her  curse  and  her  destruc¬ 
tion . Drunk  with  the  blood  of  the  saints;  blinded  by  her  own 

conceit  and  jealousy  to  the  fact  that  she  had  been  crushing  and  extir¬ 
pating  out  of  her  empire  for  centuries  past  all  which  was  noble, 
purifying,  regenerative,  divine,  she  sat  impotent  and  doting,  the 

prey  of  every  fresh  adventurer,  the  slave  of  her  own  slaves . 

“  And  the  kings  of  the  earth  who  had  sinned  with  her  hated  the  har¬ 
lot,  and  made  her  desolate  and  naked,  and  devoured  her  flesh,  and 
burned  her  with  fire.  For  God  had  put  into  their  hearts  to  fulfill  His 
will,  and  to  agree,  and  to  give  their  kingdom  to  the  beast,  until  the 
words  of  God  should  be  fulfilled.”.  . .  .Everywhere  sensuality,  divis¬ 
ion,  hatred,  treachery,  cruelty,  uncertainty,  terror. . .  .the  vials  of  ^ 

God’s  wrath  poured  out . Where  was  to  be  the  end  of  it  all?  asked 

every  man  of  his  neighbor,  generation  after  generation  ;  and  received 
for  answer  only,  “  It  is  better  to  die  than  to  live.” 

And  yet,  in  one  ship  out  of  that  sad  fleet,  there  was  peace,  peace 
amid  shame  and  terror  ;  amid  the  groans  of  the  wounded,  and  the 

(188) 


A  STRAY  GLEAM. 


18§ 


sighs  of  the  starving  ;  amid  all  but  blank  despair.  The  great  triremes 
and  quinqueremes  rushed  onward  past  the  lagging  transports,  care¬ 
less,  in  the  mad  race  for  safety,  that  they  were  leaving  the  greater 
number  of  their  comrades  defenseless  iu  the  rear  of  the  flight  ;  but 
from  one  little  fishing-craft  alone  no  base  entreaties,  no  bitter  ex¬ 
ecrations,  greeted  the  passing  flash  and  roll  of  their  mighty  oars. 
One  after  another,  day  by  day,  they  came  rushing  up  out  of  the 
northern  offing,  each  like  a  huge  hundred-footed  dragon,  panting  and 
quivering,  as  if  with  terror,  at  every  loud  pulse  of  its  oars,  hurling 
the  ’/ild  water  right  and  left  with  the  mighty  share  of  its  beak, 
while  from  the  bows  some  gorgon  or  chimera,  elephant  or  boar, 
stared  out  with  brazen  eyes  toward  the  coast  of  Africa,  as  if  it,  too, 
like  the  human  beings  which  it  carried,  was  dead  to  every  care  but 
that  of  dastard  flight.  Past  they  rushed,  one  after  another  ;  and  off 
the  poop  some  shouting  voice  chilled  all  hearts  for  a  moment  with  the 

fearful  news  that  the  Emperor’s  Neapolitan  fleet  was  in  full  chase . 

And  the  soldiers  on  board  that  little  vessel  looked  silently  and  stead¬ 
fastly  into  the  silent,  steadfast  face  of  the  old  prefect,  and  Victoria 
saw  him  shudder,  and  turn  his  eyes  away, — and  stood  up  among  the 
rough  fighting  men,  like  a  goddess,  and  cried  aloud  that  “  The  Lord 
would  protect  his  own  and  they  believed  her,  and  were  still  ;  till 
many  days  and  many  ships  were  passed,  and  the  little  fishing-craft, 
outstripped  even  by  the  transports  and  merchantmen,  as  it  strained 
and  crawled  along  before  its  single  square-sail,  was  left  alone  upon 
the  sea. 

And  where  was  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  ? 

He  was  sitting,  with  Bran’s  head  between  his  knees,  at  the  door  of 
a  temporary  awning  in  the  vessel’s  stern,  which  shielded  the 
wounded  men  from  sun  and  spray  ;  and  as  he  sat  he  could  hear  from 
within  the  tent  the  gentle  voices  of  Victoria  and  her  brother,  as  they 
tended  the  sick  like  ministering  angels,  or  read  to  them  words  of 
divine  hope  and  comfort, — in  which  his  homeless  heart  felt  that  he 
bad  no  share . 

“  As  I  live,  I  would  change  places  now  with  any  one  of  those  poor 
mangled  ruffians,  to  have  that  voice  speaking  such  words  to  me. . . . 
and  to  believe  them.”. . .  .And  he  went  on  perusing  the  manuscript 

which  he  held  in  his  hand. 

***** 

“  Well  !  ”  he  sighed  to  himself  after  a  while,  “  at  least  it  is  the 
most  complimentary,  not  to  say  hopeful,  view  of  our  destinies  with 
which  I  have  met  since  I  threw  away  my  nurse’s  belief  that  the  seed 
of  David  was  fated  to  conquer  the  whole  earth,  and  set  up  a  second 
Roman  Empire  at  Jerusalem,  only  worse  than  the  present  one,  in  that 
the  devils  of  superstition  and  bigotry  would  be  added  to  those  of 
tyranny  and  rapine.” 

A  hand  was  laid  on  his  shoulder,  and  a  voice  asked,  “And  what 
may  this  so  hopeful  view  be  ?  ” 


190 


HYIATIA. 


o 


'A 

All !  my  dear  general  !  ”  said  Eapliael,  looking  up.  “  I  liave  a 
poor  bill  of  fare  whereon  to  exercise  iny  culinary  powers  this  morn¬ 
ing.  Had  it  not  been  for  that  shark  who  was  so  luckily  deluded  last 
night,  I  should  have  been  reduced  to  the  necessity  of  stewing  my 
friend  the  fat  decurion’s  big  boots.” 

“  They  would  have  been  savory  enough,  I  will  warrant,  after  they 
had  passed  under  your  magical  hand.” 

“It  is  a  comfort,  certainly,  to  find  that,  after  all,  one  did  learn 
something  useful  in  Alexandria  !  So  I  will  even  go  forward  at  once, 
and  employ  my  artistic  skill.” 

“  Tell  me  first  what  it  was  about  which  I  heard  you  just  now 
soliloquizing,  as  so  hopeful  a  view  of  some  matter  or  other?  ” 

‘  ‘  Honestly, — if  you  will  neither  betray  me  to  your  son  and 
daughter,  nor  consider  me  as  having  in  any  wise  committed  myself, 
— it  was  Paul  of  Tarsus’s  notion  of  the  history  and  destinies  of  our 
stiff-necked  nation.  See  what  your  daughter  has  persuaded  me  into 
reading  !  ”  And  he  held  up  a  manuscript  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews.” 

“It  is  execrable  Greek.  But  it  is  sound  philosophy,  I  cannot 
deny.  He  knows  Plato  better  than  all  the  ladies  and  gentlemen  in 
Alexandria  put  together,  if  my  opinion  on  the  point  be  worth  hav¬ 
ing.” 

“  I  am  a  plain  soldier,  and  no  judge  on  that  point,  sir.  He  may  or 
may  not  know  Plato  ;  but  I  am  right  sure  that  he  knows  God.” 

“Not  too  fast,”  said  Raphael,  with  a  smile.  “You  do  not  know, 
perhaps,  that  I  have  spent  the  last  ten  years  of  my  life  among  men 
who  professed  the  same  knowledge  ?  ” 

“Augustine,  too,  spent  the  ten  best  years  of  his  life  among  such  ; 
and  yet  he  is  now  combating  the  very  errors  which  he  once  taught.” 

“  Having  found,  he  fancies,  something  better?” 

“  Having  found  it,  most  truly.  But  you  must  talk  to  him  your¬ 
self,  and  argue  the  matter  over,  with  one  who  can  argue.  To  me 
such  questions  are  an  unknown  land.” 

“  Well. ..  .Perhaps  I  may  be  tempted  to  do  even  that.  At  least, 
a  thoroughly  converted  xdiilosopher — for  poor  dear  Synesius  is  half 
heathen  still,  I  often  fancy,  and  hankers  after  the  wisdom  of  the 
Egyptian — will  be  a  curious  sight  ;  and  to  talk  with  so  famous  and 
so  learned  a  man  would  always  be  a  pleasure  ;  but  to  argue  with 
him,  or  any  other  human  being,  none  whatsoever.” 

‘  ‘  Why,  then  ?  ” 

“My  dear  sir,  I  am  sick  of  syllogisms,  and  probabilities,  and  pros 
and  contras.  What  do  I  care  if,  on  weighing  both  sides,  the  nine¬ 
teen  pounds’  weight  of  questionable  arguments  against,  are  over' 
balanced  by  the  twenty  pounds’  weight  of  equally  questionable  argu¬ 
ments  for  ?  Do  you  not  see  that  my  belief  of  the  victorious  proposi¬ 
tion  will  be  proportioned  to  the  one  overbalancing  pound  only,  while 
the  whole  other  nineteen  will  go  for  nothing  ?  ” 


A  GLEAM. 


191 


**  I  really  d©  not.” 

“Happy  are  you,  then.  I  do,  from  many  a  sad  experience.  No, 
my  worthy  sir.  I  want  a  faith  past  arguments  ;  one  which,  whether 
I  can  prove  it  or  not  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  lawyers,  I  believe  to  my 
own  satisfaction,  and  act  on  it  as  undoubtingly  and  unreasoningly  as 
I  do  upon  my  own  newly  rediscovered  personal  identity.  I  don’t 
want  to  possess  a  faith.  I  want  a  faith  which  will  possess  me.  And 
if  I  ever  arrived  at  such  a  one,  believe  me,  it  would  be  by  some  such 
practical  demonstration  as  this  very  tent  has  given  me.” 

“  This  tent  ?  ” 

“  i  es,  sir,  this  tent  ;  within  which  I  have  seen  you  and  your  chil¬ 
dren  lead  a  life  of  deeds  as  new  to  me  the  Jew,  as  they  would  be  to 
Hypatia  the  Gentile.  I  have  watched  you  for  many  a  day,  and  notin 
vain.  When  I  saw  you,  an  experienced  officer,  encumber  your  flight 
with  wounded  men,  I  was  only  surprised.  But  since  I  have  seen  you, 
and  your  daughter,  and,  strangest  of  all,  your  gay  young  Alcibiades 
of  a  son,  starving  yourselves  to  feed  those  poor  ruffians, — performing 
for  them,  day  and  night,  the  offices  of  menial  slaves, — comforting 
them,  as  no  man  ever  comforted  me, — blaming  no  one  but  yourselves, 
caring  for  every  one  but  yourselves,  sacrificing  nothing  but  yourselves  ; 
and  all  this  without  hope  of  fame  or  reward,  or  dream  of  appeasing 
the  wrath  of  any  god  or  goddess,  but  simply  because  you  thought  it 

right . When  I  saw  that,  sir,  and  more  which  I  haVe  seen  ;  and 

when,  reading  in  this  book  here,  I  found  most  unexpectedly  those 
very  grand  moral  rules  which  you  were  practicing,  seeming  to  spring 
unconsciously,  as  natural  results,  from  the  great  thoughts,  true  or 
false,  which  had  preceded  them  ;  then,  sir,  I  began  to  suspect  that 
the  creed  that  could  produce  such  deeds  as  I  have  watched  within  the 
last  few  days  might  have  on  its  side,  hot  merely  a  slight  preponder¬ 
ance  of  probabilities,  but  what  we  Jews  used  once  to  call,  when  we 
believed  in  it — or  in  anything — the  mighty  power  of  God.” 

And,  as  he  spoke,  he  looked  into  the  prefect’s  face  with  the  look  of 
a  man  wrestling  in  some  deadly  struggle  ;  so  intense  and  terrible  was 
the  earnestness  of  bis  eye,  that  even  the  old  soldier  shrunk  before  it. 

“  And  therefore,”  he  went  on,  “  therefore,  sir,  beware  of  your  own 
actions,  and  of  your  children’s.  If,  by  any  folly  or  baseness,  such  as  I 
have  seen  in  every  human  being  whom  I  ever  met  as  yet,  upon  this 
accursed  stage  of  fools,  you  shall  crush  my  new  budding  hope  that 
there  is  something  somewhere  which  will  make  me  what  I  know  that 
I  ought  to  be,  and  can  be, — if  you  shall  crush  that,  I  say,  by  any 
misdoing  of  yours,  you  had  better  have  been  the  murderer  of  my 
first-born  ;  with  such  a  hate — a  hate  which  Jews  alone  can  feel — will 
I  hate  you  and  yours.” 

“  God  help  us  and  strengthen  us  !  ”  said  the  old  warrior,  in  a  tone 
of  noble  humility. 

“And  now,”  said  Raphael,  glad  to  change  the  subject,  after  this 
unwonted  outburst,  “  we  must  once  more  seriously  consider  whether 


193  ETPATIA: 

it  is  wise  to  hold  on  our  present  course.  If  you  return  to  Carthage, 
or  to  Hippo - ” 

“  I  shall  be  beheaded,” 

“Most  assuredly.  And  how  much  soever  you  may  consider  such 
an  event  a  gain  to  yourself,  yet  for  the  sake  of  your  son  and  your 
daughter - ” 

“  My  dear  sir,”  interrupted  the  prefect,  “  you  mean  kindly.  But  do 
not,  do  not  tempt  me.  By  the  Count’s  side  I  have  fought  for  thirty 
years,  and  by  his  side  I  will  die,  as  I  deserve,” 

“  Victorious  !  Victoria  !  ”  cried  Raphael  ;  “help  me  !  Your  father,” 
he  went  on,  as  they  came  out  from  the  tent,  “  is  still  decided  on  los¬ 
ing  his  own  head,  and  throwing  away  ours,  by  going  to  Cafthage.” 

“For  my  sake — for  our  sakes — father  !  ”  cried  Victoria,  clinging  to 
him, 

“  And  for  my  sake,  also,  most  excellent  sir,”  said  Raphael,  smiling 
quietly,  “  I  have  no  wish  to  be  so  uncourteous  as  to  urge  any  help 
which  I  may  have  seemed  to  afford  you.  But  I  hope  that  you  will 
recollect  that  I  have  a  life  to  lose,  and  that  it  is  hardly  fair  of  you  to 
imperil  it,  as  you  intend  to  do.  If  you  could  help  or  save  Heraclian, 
I  should  be  dumb  at  once.  But  now,  for  a  mere  point  of  honor,  to  de¬ 
stroy  fifty  good  soldiers,  who  know  not  their  right  hands  from  their 
left — Shall  I  ask  their  opinion  ?  ” 

“Will  you  raise  a  mutiny  against  me,  sir?”  asked  the  old  man, 
sternly, 

“Why  not  mutiny  against  Philip  drunk  in  behalf  of  Philip  sober  ? 

But  really,  I  will  obey  you. ..  .only  you  must  obey  us . -'What 

is  Hesiod’s  definition  of  the  man  who  will  neither  counsel  himself 
nor  be  counseled  by  his  friends?. . . .  Have  you  no  trusty  acquaintances 
in  Cyrenaica,  for  instance  ?  ” 

The  prefect  was  silent. 

“  O,  hear  us,  my  father  !  Why  not  go  to  Euodius  ?  He  is  your 

old  comrade, — a  well-wisher,  too,  to  this. . . .  this  expedition . And 

recollect,  Augustine  must  be  there  now.  H-e  was  about  to  sail  for 
Berenice,  in  order  to  consult  Synesius  and  the  Pentapolitan  bishops, 
when  we  left  Carthage.” 

And  at  the  name  of  Augustine  the  old  man  paused. 

“Augustine  will  be  there  ;  true.  And  this  our  friend  must  meet 
him.  And  thus  at  least  I  should  have  his  advice.  If  he  thinks  it  my 
duty  to  return  to  Carthage;  I  can  but  do  so,  after  all.  But  the 
soldiers  ?” 

“Excellent  sir,”  said  Raphael,  “Synesius  and  the  Pentapolitan 
landlords — who  can  hardly  call  their  lives  their  own,  thanks  to  the 
Moors — will  be  glad  enough  to  feed  and  pay  them,  or  any  other  brave 
fellows  with  arms  in  their  hands,  at  this  moment.  And  my  friend 
Victorius,  here,  will  enjoy,  I  do  not  doubt,  a  little  wild  campaigning 
against  marauding  blackamoors.” 

The  old  man  bowed  silently.  The  battle  was  won. 


M 


A  STRAY  GLEAM. 

I'iie  young  tribune,  wbo  had  been  watching  his  father’s  face  with 
the  most  intense  anxiety,  caught  at  the  gesture,  and,  hurrying  for¬ 
ward,  announced  the  change  of  plan  to  the  soldiery.  It  was  greeted 
with  a  shout  of  joy,  and  in  another  five  minutes  the  sails  were  about, 
the  rudders  shifted,  and  the  ship  on  her  way  toward  the  western 
point  of  Sicily,  before  a  steady  northwest  bree/e. 

“  Ah  !”  cried  Victoria,  delighted.  “  And  now  you  will  see  Augus¬ 
tine  !  You  must  promise  me  to  talk  to  him  !  ” 

“  This,  at  least,  I  will  promise,  that  whatsoever  the  great  sophist 
shall  be  pleased  to  say  shall  meet  with  a  patient  hearing  from  a  brother 
sophist.  Do  not  be  angry  at  the  term.  Recollect  that  I  am  somewhat 
tired,  like  my  ancestor  Solomon,  of  wisdom  and  wise  men,  having 
found  it  only  too  like  madness  and  folly.  And  you  cannot  surely 
expect  me  to  believe  in  man,  while  I  do  not  yet  believe  in  God  ?  ” 

Victoria  sighed.  “  I  will  not  believe  you.  Why  always  pretend  to 
be  worse  than  you  are  ?  ” 

“  That  kind  souls  like  you  may  be  spared  the  pain  of  finding  me 

worse  than  I  seem . There,  let  us  say  no  more;  except  that  I 

heartily  wish  that  you  would  hate  me  !  ” 

“  Shall  I  try 

“  That  must  be  my  work,  I  fear,  not  yours.  However,  I  shall  give 
you  good  cause  enough  before  long,  doubt  it  not.” 

Victoria  sighed  again,  and  retired  into  the  tent  to  nurse  the  sick. 

“  And  now,  sir,”  said  the  prefect,  turning  to  Raphael  and  his  son, 
*‘do  not  mistake  me.  I  may  have  been  weak,  as  worn-out  and 
hopeless  men  are  wont  to  be  ;  but  do  not  think  of  me  as  one  who  has 
yielded  to  adversity  in  fear  for  his  own  safety.  As  God  hears  me,  I 
desire  nothing  better  than  to  die  ;  and  I  only  turn  out  of  my  course 
on  the  understanding  that,  if  Augustine  so  advise,  my  children  hold 
me  free  to  return  to  Carthage  and  meet  my  fate.  All  I  pray  for  is, 
that  my  life  may  be  spared  until  I  can  place  my  dear  child  in  the 
safe  shelter  of  a  nunnery.” 

“  A  nunnery  ?” 

“  Yes,  indeed  ;  I  have  intended,  ever  since  her  birth,  to  dedicate 
her  to  the  service  of  God.  And  in  such  times  as  these  what  better 
lot  for  a  defenseless  girl  ?  ” 

“  Pardon  me  !  ”  said  Raphael  ;  “  but  I  am  too  dull  to  comprehend 
what  benefit  or  pleasure  your  Deity  will  derive  from  the  celibacy  of 

your  daughter . Except,  indeed,  on  one  supposition,  which,  as  I 

have  some  faint  remnants  of  reverence  and  decency  re- awakening  in 
me  just  now,  I  must  leave  to  be  uttered  only  by  the  pure  lips  of  sex¬ 
less  priests.” 

“  You  forget,  sir,  that  you  are  speaking  to  a  Christian.” 

“I  assure  you,  no  !  I  had  certainly  been  forgetting  it  till  the 
last  two  minutes,  in  your  very  pleasant  and  rational  society.  There 
is  no  danger  henceforth  of  my  making  so  silly  a  mistake.” 

“  Sir  !  ”  said  the  prefect,  reddening  at  the  undisguised  contempt  of 
HYPATIA — 7 


I 


194  HYPATIA. 

Eapliael’s  manner . “  When  you  know  a  little  more  of  St,  Paul’s 

Epistles,  you  will  cease  to  insult  the  opinions  and  feelings  of  those 
who  obey  them,  by  sacrificing  their  most  precious  treasures  to  God.” 

“  O,  it  is  Paul  of  Tarsus,  then  who  gives  you  the  advice  ?  I  thank 
you  for  informing  me  of  the  fact  ;  for  it  will  save  me  the  trouble  of 
any  future  study  of  his  works.  Allow  me,  therefore,  to  return  by 
your  hands  this  manuscript  of  his,  with  many  thanks  from  me  to  that 
daughter  of  yours  by  whose  perpetual  imprisonment  you  intend  to 
give  pleasure  to  your  Deity.  Henceforth,  the  less  communication 
which  passes  between  me  and  any  member  of  your  family,  the  bet¬ 
ter.”  And  he  turned  away. 

‘‘But,  my  dear  sir! ’’said  the  honest  soldier,  really  chagrined, 
“  you  must  not  ! — we  owe  you  too  much,  and  love  you  too  well,  to 
part  thus  for  the  caprice  of  a  moment.  If  any  word  of  mine  has 
offended  you,  forget  it,  and  forgive  me,  I  beseech  you  1  ”  and  he 
caught  both  Raphael’s  hands  in  his  own. 

“  My  very  dear  sir  !  ”  answered  the  Jew,  quietly,  “let  me  ask  the 
same  forgiveness  of  you  ;  and  believe  me,  for  the  sake  of  past  pleas¬ 
ant  passages,  I  shall  not  forget  my  promise  about  the  mortgage . 

But — here  we  must  part.  To  tell  you  the  truth,  I  half  an  hour  ago 
was  fearfully  near  becoming  neither  more  nor  less  than  a  Christian. 
I  had  actually  deluded  myself  into  the  fancy  that  the  Deity  of  the 
Galileans  might  be,  after  all,  the  God  of  our  old  forefathers, — of 
Adam  and  Eve,  of  Abraham  and  David,  and  of  the  rest  who  believed 
that  children  and  the  fruit  of  the  womb  were  an  heritage  and  gift 
wdiich  cometh  of  the  Lord, — and  that  Paul  was  right — acHially  right 
— in  his  theory  that  the  church  was  the  development  and  fulfillment 

of  our  old  national  polity . I  must  thank  you  for  opening  my  eyes 

to  a  mistake  which,  had  I  not  been  besotted  for  the  moment,  every 
monk  and  nun  would  have  contradicted  by  the  mere  fact  of  their  ex¬ 
istence,  and  reserve  my  nascent  faith  for  some  Deity  who  takes  no 
delight  in  seeing  his  creatures  stultify  the  primary  laws  of  their  be¬ 
ing.  Farewell  I  ” 

And  while  the  prefect  stood  petrified  with  astonishment,  he  retired 
to  the  farther  extremity  of  the  deck,  muttering  to  himself, — 

“  Did  I  not  know,  all  along,  that  this  gleam  was  too  sudden  and 
too  bright  to  last  ?  Did  I  not  know  that  he,  too,  would  prove  him¬ 
self,  like  all  the  rest — an  ass?.  . .  .Fool  !  to  have  looked  for  common 
sense  on  such  an  earth  as  this  !.  .  .  .Back  to  chaos  again,  Raphael 
Aben-Ezra,  and  spin  ropes  of  sand  to  the  end  of  the  farce  I  ” 

And,  mixing  with  the  soldiers,  he  exchanged  no  word  with  the 
prefect  and  his  children  till  they  reached  the  port  of  Berenice  ;  and 
then,  putting  the  necklace  into  Victoria’s  hands  vanished  among  the 
crowds  upon  the  quay,  no  one  knew  whither. 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 


THE  PREFECT  TESTED. 

When  we  lost  siglit  of  Plnlammon,  liis  destiny  liad  hurled  him 
©lice  more  among  his  old  friends  the  Goths,  in  search  of  two 
important  elements  of  human  comfort,  freedom  and  a  sister.  The 
former  he  found  at  once,  in  a  large  hall  where  sundry  Goths  were 
lounging  and  toping,  into  the  nearest  corner  of  which  he  shrunk,  and 
stood,  his  late  terror  and  rage  forgotten  altogether  in  the  one  new 
and  absorbing  thought, — His  sister  might  be  in  that  house  !. . .  .and 
yielding  to  so  sweet  a  dream,  he  began  fancying  to  himself  which  of 
all  those  gay  maidens  she  might  be  who  had  become  in  one  moment 
more  dear,  more  great  to  him,  than  all  things  else  in  heaven  or  earth. 
That  fair-haired,  rounded  Italian?  That  fierce,  luscious,  aquiline¬ 
faced  Jewess?  That  delicate,  swart,  sidelong-eyed  Copt?  No  !  She 
was  Athenian,  like  himself.  That  tall,  lazy  Greek  girl,  then,  from 
beneath  whose  sleepy  lids  fiashed,  once  an  hour,  sudden  lightnings, 
revealing  depths  of  thought  and  feeling  uncultivated,  perhaps  even 
unsuspected,  by  their  possessor  ?  Her  ? — Or  that,  her  seeming  sister  ? 
Or  the  next  ?. . .  .Or — Was  it  Pelagia  herself,  most  beautiful  and  most 
sinful  of  them  all?  Fearful  thought  !  He  blushed  scarlet  at  the 
bare  imagination  :  yet  why,  in  his  secret  heart,  was  that  the  most 
pleasant  hypothesis  of  them  all  ?  And  suddenly  flashed  across  him 
that  observation  of  one  of  the  girls  on  board  the  boat,  on  his  likeness 
to  Pelagia.  Strange,  that  he  had  never  recollected  it  before  !  It 
must  be  so  !  And  yet  on  what  a  slender  thread,  woven  of  scattered 
hints  and  surmises,  did  that  “  must  ”  depend  !  He  would  be  sane  ; 
he  would  wait ;  he  would  have  patience.  Patience,  with  a  sister  yet 
unfound,  perhaps  perishing  ?  Impossible  ! 

Suddenly  the  train  of  his  thoughts  was  changed  perforce  : — 

“Come!  come  and  seel  There’s  a  fight  in  the  streets,”  called 
one  of  the  damsels,  down  the  stairs,  at  the  highest  pitch  of  her 
voice. 

“I  sha’n’t  go,”  yawned  a  huge  fellow,  who  was  lying  on  his  back 
on  a  sofa. 

“O,  come  up,  my  hero,”  said  one  of  the  girls.  “  Such  a  charming 
riot,  and  the  prefect  himself  in  the  middle  of  it  I  We  have  not  had 
such  a  one  in  the  street  this  month.” 

“  The  princes  won’t  let  me  knock  any  of  these  donkey-riders  on  the 
head,  and  seeing  other  people  do  it  only  makes  me  envious.  Give 
me  the  wiue-iug, — curse  the  girl  !  she’s  run  up-stairs  I” 

(195) 


196 


MtPATlA. 


'  Tlie  sliouting  and  trampling  came  nearer  ;  and  in  anotlier  minute 
Wulf  came  rapidly  down-stairs,  tlirougli  tlie  liall  into  tlie  harem- 
court,  and  into  the  presence  of  the  Amah 

“  Prince,  here  is  a  chance  for  us.  These  rascally  Greeks  are  mur¬ 
dering  their  prefect  under  our  very  windows.” 

“  The  lying  cur  !  Serve  him  right  for  cheating  us.  He  has  plenty 
of  guards.  Why  can’t  the  fool  take  care  of  himself  ?  ” 

“  They  have  all  run  away,  and  I  saw  some  of  them  hiding  among 
the  mob.  As  I  live,  the  man  will  be  killed  in  five  minutes  more.” 

“  Why  not  ?  ” 

“  Why  should  he,  when  we  can  save  him  and  win  his  favor  for¬ 
ever  ?  The  men’s  fingers  are  itching  for  a  fight  ;  it’s  a  bad  plan 
not  to  give  hounds  blood  now  and  then,  or  they  lose  the  knacfe  ©f 
hunting.” 

“  Well,  it  wouldn’t  take  five  minutes.” 

“  And  heroes  should  show  that  they  can  forgive  when  an  enemy  is 
in  distress.” 

“  Very  true  !  Like  an  Amal  too  !  ”  And  the  Amal  sprung  up  and 
shouted  to  his  men  to  follow  him. 

“Good-by,  my  pretty  one.  Why,  Wulf,”  cried  he,  as  he  burst 
out  into  the  court,  “here’s  our  monk  again  !  By  Odin,  you’re  wel¬ 
come,  my  handsome  boy  !  Come  along  and  fight  too,  young  fellow  ; 
what  were  those  arms  given  you  for  ?  ” 

“He  is  my  man,”  said  Wulf,  laying  his  hand  on  Philammon’s 
shoulder,  “and  blood  he  shall  taste.”  And  out  the  three  hurried, 
Philammon,  in  his  present  reckless  mood,  ready  for  anything. 

“  Bring  your  whips.  Never  mind  swords.  Those  rascals  are  not 
worth  it,”  shouted  the  Amal,  as  he  hurried  down  the  passage 
brandishing  his  heavy  thong,  some  ten  feet  in  length,  threw  the  gate 
open,  and  the  next  moment  recoiled  from  a  dense  crush  of  people 
who  surged  in, — and  surged  out  again  as  rapidly,  as  the  Goth,  with 
the  combined  force  of  his  weight  and  arm,  hewed  his  way  straight 
through  them,  felling  a  wretch  at  every  blow,  and  followed  up  by 
his  terrible  companions. 

They  were  but  just  in  time.  The  four  white  blood-horses  were 
plunging  and  rolling  over  each  other,  and  Orestes  reeling  in  his 
chariot  with  a  stream  of  blood  running  down  his  face,  and  the  hands 
of  twenty  wild  monks  clutching  at  him.  “  Monks  again  !  ”  thought 
Philammon  ;  and  as  he  saw  among  them  more  than  one  hateful 
face,  which  he  recollected  in  Cyril’s  court-yard  on  that  fatal  night, 
a  flush  of  fierce  revenge  ran  through  him. 

“  Mercy  !  ”  shrieked  the  miserable  prefect, — “  I  am  a  Christian  !  I 
swear  that  I  am  a  Christian  !  The  Bishop  Atticus  baptized  me  at 
Constantinople  !  ” 

“Down  with  the  butcher!  down  with  the  heathen  tyrant,  who 
refuses  the  adjuration  on  the  Gospels  rather  than  be  reconciled  to 
the  patriarch  !  Tear  him  out  of  the  chariot  1  ”  yelled  the  monks. 


TH^  PREFECT  TESTED. 


m 

The  craven  hound  !  ”  said  the  Amal,  stopping  short,  “  I  won’t 
help  him  !”  But  in  an  instant  Wulf  rushed  forward,  and  struck 
right  and  left ;  the  monks  recoiled,  and  Philammon,  burning  to  pre¬ 
vent  so  shameful  a  scandal  to  the  faith  to  which  he  still  clung 
convulsively,  sprung  into  the  chariot  and'baught  Orestes  in  his  arms. 

You  are  safe,  my  lord  ;  don’t  struggle,”  whispered  he,  while  the 
monks  flew  on  him.  A  s.tone  or  two  struck  him,  but  they  only 
quickened  his  determination,  and  in  another  moment  the  whistling 
of  the  whips  round  his  head,  and  the  yell  and  backward  rush  of 
the  monks  told  him  that  he  was  safe.  He  carried  his  burden  safely 
within  the  doorway  of  Pelagia’s  house,  into  the  crowd  of  peeping 
and  shrieking  damsels,  where  twenty  pairs  of  the  prettiest  hands  in 
Alexandria  seized  on  him,  and  drew  him  into  the  court. 

“  Like  a  second  Hylas,  carried  off  by  the  nymphs  !  ”  simpered  he, 
as  he  vanished  into  the  harem,  to  re -appear  in  five  minutes,  his 
head  bound  up  with  silk  handkerchiefs,  and  with  as  much  of  his 
usual  impudence  as  he  could  muster. 

“  Your  excellency, — heroes  all, — I  am  your  devoted  slave . I 

owe  you  life  itself  ;  and  more,  the  valor  of  your  succor  is  only  sur¬ 
passed  by  the  deliciousness  of  your  cure.  I  would  gladly  undergo  a 
second  wound  to  enjoy  a  second  time  the  services  of  such  hands,  and 
to  see  such  feet  busying  themselves  on  my  behalf.” 

“You  wouldn’t  have  said  that  five  minutes  ago,”  quoth  the  Amal, 
looking  at  hkn  very  much  as  a  bear  might  at  a  monkey. 

“Never  mind  the  hands  and  feet,  old  fellow;  they  are  none  of 
yours  !  ”  bluntly  observed  a  voice  from  behind,  probably  Smid’s,  and 
a  laugh  ensued. 

“My  saviours,  my  brothers  !”  said  Orestes,  politely  ignoring  the 
laughter.  ‘  ‘  How  can  I  repay  you  ?  In  there  anything  in  which  my 
office  here  enables  me — I  will  not  say  to  reward,  for  that  would  be  a 
term  beneath  your  dignity  as  free  barbarians — but  to  gratify  you  ?  ” 

“  Give  us  three  days’  pillage  of  the  quarter  !  ”  shouted  some  one. 

“  Ah,  true  valor  is  apt  to  underrate  obstacles  ;  you  forget  your 
small  numbers.” 

“  1  say,”  quoth  the  Amal  ;  “  I  say,  take  care,  prefect.  If  you 
mean  to  tell  me  that  we  forty  couldn’t  cut  all  the  throats  in  Alex¬ 
andria  in  three  days,  and  yours  into  the  bargain,  and  keep  your  soldiers 
at  bay  all  the  time - ” 

“  Half  of  them  would  join  us  !  ”  cried  some  one.  “  They  are  half 
our  own  flesh  and  blood,  after  all  !  ” 

“Pardon  me,  my  friends,  I  do  not  doubt  it  a  moment.  I  know 
enough  of  the  world  never  to  have  found  a  sheep-dog  yet  who  would 
not,  on  occasion,  help  to  make  away  with  a  little  of  the  mutton 
which  he  guarded.  Eh,  my  venerable  sir?  ”  turning  to  Wulf,  with 
a  knowing  bow. 

Wulf  chuckled  grimly,  and  said  something  to  the  Amal  in  German 
about  being  civil  to  guests. 


ISrPATlA. 


m 

“You  will  pardon  me,  my  heroic  friends,”  said  Orestes,  “  but, 
with  your  kind  permission,  I  will  observe  that  I  am  somewhat  faint 
and  disturbed  by  late  occurrences.  To  trespass  on  your  hospitality 
further  would  be  an  impertinence.  If,  therefore,  I  might  send  a 
slave  to  find  some  of  my  apparitors - ” 

“No,  by  all  the  gods  !”  roared  the  Amal  ;  “  you’re  my  guest, 
now, — my  lady’s  at  least.  And  no  one  ever  went  out  of  my  house 
sober  yet  if  I  could  help  it.  Set  the  cooks  to  work,  my  men  !  The 
prefect  shall  feast  with  us  like  an  emperor,  and  we’ll  send  him  home 
to-night  as  drunk  as  he  can  wish.  Come  along,  your  excellency  ; 
we’re  rough  fellows,  we  Goths  ;  but  by  the  Valkyrs,  no  one  can  say 
that  we  neglect  our  guests  !  ” 

It  is  a  sweet  compulsion,”  said  Orestes,  as  he  went  in. 

“Stop,  by  the  by  !  Didn’t  one  of  you  men  catch  a  monk?” 

“  Here  he  is,  prince,  with  his  elbows  safe  behind  him.  ”  And  a 
tall,  haggard,  half-naked  monk  was  dragged  forward. 

“Capital!  bring  him  in.  His  excellency  shall  judge  him  while 
dinner’s  cooking,  and  Smid  shall  have  the  hanging  of  him.  He  hurt 
nobody  in  the  scuffle  ;  he  was  thinking  of  his  dinner.” 

“  Some  rascal  bit  a  piece  out  of  my  leg,  and  I  tumbled  down,” 
grumbled  Smid. 

“Well,  pay  out  this  fellow  for  it,  then.  Bring  a  chair,  slaves. 
Here,  your  highness,  sit  there  and  judge,” 

“  Two  chairs  I  ”  said  some  one  ;  “  the  Amal  sha’n’t  stand,  before 
ihe  emperor  himself.” 

“  By  all  means,  my  dear  friends.  The  Amal  and  I  will  act  as  the 
two  Caesars,  with  divided  empire.  I  presume  we  shall  have  little 
difference  of  opinion  as  to  the  hanging  of  this  worthy.” 

“  Hanging’s  too  quick  for  him.” 

“Just  what  I  was  about  to  remark; — there  are  certain  judicial 
formalities,  considered  generally  to  be  conducive  to  the  stability,  if 
not  necessary  to  the  existence,  of  the  Roman  empire - ” 

“  I  say,  don’t  talk  so  much,”  shouted  a  Goth.  “  If  you  want  to 
have  the  hanging  of  him  yourself,  do.  We  thought  we  would  save 
you  trouble.” 

“  Ah,  my  excellent  friend,  would  you  rob  me  of  the  delicate  pleasure 
of  revenge  ?  I  intend  to  spend  at  least  four  hours  to-morrow  in  killing 
this  pious  martyr.  He  will  have  a  good  time  to  think,  between  the 
beginning  and  the  end  of  the  rack,” 

“  Do  you  hear  that,  master  monk? ’’said  Smid,  chucking  him  under 
the  chin,  while  the  rest  of  the  party  seemed  to  think  the  whole 
business  an  excellent  joke,  and  divided  their  ridicule  openly  enough 
between  the  prefect  and  his  victim. 

“  The  man  of  blood  has  said  it.  I  am  a  martyr,”  answered  the 
monk,  in  a  dogged  voice. 

“  You  will  take  a  good  deal  of  time  in  becoming  one.” 

“Death  may  be  long,  but  glory  is  everlasting.” 


190 


TBE  PREFECT  TESTER. 

True.  I  forgot  tliat,  and  will  save  you  the  said  glory,  if  I  can 
help  it,  for  a  year  or  two.  Who  was- it  struck  me  with  the  stone  ?  ” 

No  answer. 

Tell  me,  and  the  moment  he  is  in  my  lictors’  hands  I  pardon  you 
freely.’^ 

The  monk  laughed.  “  Pardon  ?  Pardon  me  eternal  bliss  and  the 
things  unspeakable,  which  God  has  prepared  for  those  who  love  him  ? 
Tyrant  and  butcher  !  1  struck  thee,  thou  second  Dioclesian, — I  hurled 

the  stone, — I,  Ammonius.  Would  to  heaven  that  it  had  smitten  thee 
through,  thou  Sisera,  like  the  nail  of  Jael  the  Kenite  !” 

“  Thanks,  my  friend.  Heroes,  you  have  a  cellar  for  monks  as 
well  as  for  wine  ?  I  will  trouble  you  with  this  hero’s  psalm-singing 
to-night,  and  send  my  apparitors  for  him  in  the  morning.” 

“  If  he  begins  howling  when  we  are  in  bed,  your  men  won’t  find 
much  of  him  left  in  the  morning,”  said  the  Amal.  “  But  here  come 
the  slaves,  announcing  dinner.” 

“  Stay,”  said  Orestes  ;  “  there  is  one  more  with  whom  I  have  an 
account  to  settle, — that  young  philosopher  there.” 

“Oh,  he  is  coming  in,  too.  He  never  was  drunk  in  his  life,  I’U 
warrant,  poor  fellow,  and  it’s  high  time  for  him  to  begin.”  And 
the  Amal  laid  a  good-natured  .bear’s  paw  on  Philammon’s  shoulder, 
who  hung  back  in  perplexity,  and  cast  a  piteous  look  toward 
Wulf. 

W ulf  answered  it  by  a  shake  of  the  head,  which  gave  Philammon 
courage  to  stammer  out  a  courteous  refusal.  The  Amal  swore  an 
oath  at  him  which  made  the  cloister  ring  again,  and,  with  a  quiet 
shove  of  his  heavy  hand,  sent  him  staggering  half  across  the  court ; 
but  Wulf  interposed. 

“  The  boy  is  mine,  prince.  He  is  no  drunkard,  and  I  will  not  let 
him  become  one.  Would  to  heaven,”  added  he,  under  his  breath, 
“  that  I  could  say  the  same  to  some  others.  Send  us  out  our  supper 
here,  when  you  are  done.  Half  a  sheep  or  so  will  do  between  us  ; 
and  enough  of  the  strongest  to  wash  it  down  with.  Smid  knows  my 
quantity.” 

‘  ‘  Why  in  heaven’s  name  are  you  not  coming  in  ?  ” 

“  That  mob  will  be  trying  to  burst  the  gates  again  before  two 
hours  are  out ;  and  as  some  one  must  stand  sentry,  it  may  as  well  be 
a  man  who  will  not  have  his  ears  stopped  up  by  wine  and  women’s 
kisses.  The  boy  will  stay  with  me.” 

So  the  party  went  in,  leaving  Wulf  and  Philammon  alone  in  the 
outer  hall. 

There  the  two  sat  for  some  half-hour,  casting  stealthy  glances  at 
each  other,  and  wondering,  perhaps,  each  of  them  vainly  enough, 
what  was  going  on  in  the  opposite  brain.  Philammon,  though  his 
heart  was  full  of  his  sister,  could  not  help  noticing  the  air  of  deep 
sadness  which  hung  about  the  scarred  and  weather-beaten  features  of 
the  old  warrior.  The  grimness  which  he  had  remarked  on  their  first 


ETPATIA. 


^00 

meeting  seemed  to  be  now  changed  into  a  settled  melancholy.  Tii6 
furrows  round  his  mouth  and  eyes  had  become  deeper  and  sharper. 
Some  perpetual  indignation  seemed  smoldering  in  the  knitted  brow 
and  protruding  upper  lip.  He  sat  there  silent  and  motionless  for 
some  half-hour,  his  chin  resting  on  his  hands,  and  they  again  upon 
the  but  of  his  axe,  apparently  in  deep  thought,  and  listening  with  a 
silent  sneer  at  the  clinking  of  glasses  and  dishes  within, 

Philammon  felt  too  much  respect,  both  for ’his  age  and  his  stately 
sadness,  to  break  the  silence.  At  last  some  louder  burst  of  merri¬ 
ment  than  usual  aroused  him. 

“  What  do  you  call  that?”  said  he,  speaking  in  Greek. 

“Folly  and  vanity.” 

“  And  what  does  she  there, — the  Alruna, — the  prophet-woman, 
call  it  ?  ” 

“  Whom  do  you  mean  ?” 

“Why,  the  Greek  woman  whom  we  went  to  hear  talk  this 
morning  ?  ” 

“  Folly  and  vanity.” 

“  Why  can’t  she  cure  that  Roman  hair-dresser  there  of  it  then?” 

Philammon  was  silent, — “  Why  not,  indeed  !  ” 

“  Do  you  think  she  could  cure  any  one  of  it  ?  ” 

“  Of  what?” 

“Of  getting  drunk,  and' wasting  their  strength  and  their  fame, 
and  their  hard-won  treasures,  upon  eating  and  drinking,  and  fine 
clothes,  and  bad  women.” 

“  She  is  most  pure  herself,  and  she  preaches  purity  to  all  who 
hear  her.” 

“  Curse  preaching.  I  have  preached  for  these  four  months.” 

“  Perhaps  she  may  have  some  more  winning  arguments, — per¬ 
haps - ” 

“  I  know.  Such  a  beautiful  bit  of  flesh  and  blood  as  she  is  might 
get  a  hearing,  when  a  grizzled  old  head-splitter  like  me  was  called 
a  dotard.  Eh?  Well.  It’s  natural.” 

A  long  silence, 

“  She  is  a  grand  woman.  I  never  saw  such  a  one,  and  I  have  seen 
many.  There  was  a  prophetess  once  lived  in  an  island  in  the  Weser 
stream, — and  when  a  man  saw  her,  even  before  she  spoke  a  word, 
one  longed  to  crawl  to  her  feet  on  all  fours,  and  say,  ‘  There,  tread 
on  me  ;  I  am  not  fit  for  you  to  wipe  your  feet  upon.’  And  many  a 

warrior  did  it . Perhaps  I  may  have  done  it  myself,  before  now. 

....  And  this  one  is  strangely  like  her.  She  would  make  a  prince’s 
wife,  now,” 

Philammon  started.  What  new  feeling  was  it,  which  made  him 
so  indignant  at  the  notion  ? 

“Beauty?  What’s  body  without  soul?  What’s  beauty  without 
wisdom  ?  What’s  beauty  without  chasity  ?  Beast  !  fool  !  wallowing 
in  the  mire  which  every  hog  has  fouled  !  ” 


THE  PREFECT  TESTED. 


201 


**  Like  a  jewel  of  gold  in  a  swine’s  snout,  so  is  a  fair  woman  who  is 
without  discretion.” 

“  Who  said  that  ?  ” 

**  Solomon,  the  king  of  Israel.” 

“  I  never  heard  of  him.  But  he  was  a  right  Sagaman,  whoever 
said  it.  And  she  is  a  pure  maiden,  that  other  one  ?  ” 

“  Spotless  as  the” — blessed  Virgin,  Philammon  was  going  to  say, 
but  checked  himself.  There  were  sad  recollections  about  the  words. 

Wolf  sat  silent  for  a  few  minutes,  while  Philammon’s  thoughts 
reverted  at  once  to  the  new  purpose  for  which  alone  life  seemed 

worth  having . To  find  his  sister  !  That  one  thought  had  in  a 

few  hours  changed  and  matured  the  boy  into  the  man.  Hitherto  ho 
had  been  only  the  leaf  before  the  wind,  the  puppet  of  every  new  im¬ 
pression  ;  but  now  circumstance,  which  had  been  leading  him  along 
in  such  soft  fetters  for  many  a  month,  was  become  his  deadly  foe  ; 
and  all  his  energy  and  cunning,  all  his  little  knowledge  of  man  and 
of  society,  rose  up  sturdily  and  shrewdly  to  fight  in  this  new  cause. 
Wulf  was  now  no  longer  a  phenomenon  to  be  wondered  at,  but  an 
instrument  to  be  used.  The  broken  hints  which  he  had  just  given 
of  discontent  with  Pelagia’s  presence  inspired  the  boy  with  sudden 
hope,  and  cautiously  he  began  to  hint  at  the  existence  of  persons  who 
would  be  glad  to  remove  her.  Wulf  caught  at  the  notion,  and  replied 
to  it  with  searching  questions,  till  Philammon,  finding  plain  speak¬ 
ing  the  better  part  of  cunning,  told  him  openly  the  whole  events  of 
the  morning,  and  the  mystery  which  Arsenins  had  half  revealed  ; 
and  then  shuddered  with  mingled  joy  and  horror  as  Wulf,  after 
ruminating  over  the  matter  for  a  weary  five  minutes,  made  answer, — 

“  And  what  if  Pelagia  herself  were  your  sister  ?” 

Philammon  was  bursting  forth  in  some  passionate  answer,  when 
the  old  man  stopped  him,  and  went  on  slowly,  looking  him  through 
and  through, — 

‘  ‘  Because,  when  a  penniless  young  monk  claims  kin  with  a  woman 
who  is  drinking  out  of  the  wine-cups  of  the  Ca3sars,  and  filling  a 
place  for  a  share  of  which  kings’  daughters  have  been  thankful, — 
and  will  be  again  before  long, — why,  then,  though  an  old  man  may 
be  too  good-natured  to  call  it  all  a  lie  at  first  sight,  he  can’t  help  sup¬ 
posing  that  the  young  monk  has  an  eye  to  his  own  personal  profit, 
eh  ?  ” 

“  My  profit  ?”  cried  poor  Philammon,  starting  up.  “  Good  God  ! 
what  object  on  earth  can  I  have,  but  to  rescue  her  from  this  infamy, 
to  purity  and  holiness  ?  ” 

He  had  touched  the  wrong  chord. 

“  Infamy  ?  you  accursed  Egyptian  slave  !  ”  cried  the  prince,  start¬ 
ing  up  in  liis  turn,  red  with  passion,  and  clutching  at  the  whip  which 
hung  over  his  head.  “  Infamy  ?  As  if  she,  and  you  too,  ought  not 
to  consider  yourselves  blessed  in  her  being  allowed  to  wash  the  feet 
of  an  Amal  I  ” 


202 


HYPATIA 


“  O,  forgive  me!  ”  said  Pliilammon,  terrified  at  the  fruits  of  his  own 
clumsiness.  “  But  you  forget, — you  forget,  she  is  not  married  to  him  I  ” 
“  Married  to  him  ?  A  freedwoman  ?  No  ;  thank  Freya  1  he  has 
not  fallen  as  low  as  that,  at  least ;  and  never  shall,  if  I  kill  the 
witch  with  my  own  hands.  A  freedwoman  I  ” 

Poor  Pliilammon  !  And  he  had  been  told  but  that  morning  that  he 
was  a  slave.  He  hid  his  face  in  his  hands,  and  burst  into  an  agony 
of  tears. 

“  Come,  come,”  said  the  testy  warrior,  softened  at  once.  “Wo¬ 
man’s  tears  don’t  matter  ;  but  somehow  I  never  could  bear  to  make  a 
man  cry.  When  you  are  cool,  and  have  learned  common  courtesy, 
we’ll  talk  more  about  all  this.  So  I  Hush  ;  enough  is  enough. 
Here  comes  the  supper,  and  I  am  as  hungry  as  Loke.” 

And  he  commenced  devouring,  like  his  namesake,  “the gray  beast 
of  the  wood,”  and  forcing,  in  his  rough,  hospitable  way,  Philammon 
to  devour  also,  much  against  his  will  and  stomach. 

“  There,  I  feel  happier  now  1”  quoth  Wulf,  at  last.  “  There  is 
nothing  to  be  done  in  this  accursed  place  but  to  eat.  I  get  no  fight¬ 
ing,  no  hunting.  I  hate  women  as  they  hate  me.  I  don’t  know  any¬ 
thing,  indeed,  that  I  don’t  hate,  except  eating  and  singing.  And 
now,  what  with  those  girls’  vile,  unmanly  harps  and  llutes,  no  one  cares 
to  listen  to  a  true,  rattling  war-song.  There  they  are  at  it  now,  with 
their  caterwauling,  squealing  all  together  like  a  set  of  starlings  on  a 
foggy  morning  !  We’ll  have  a  song,  too,  to  drown  the  noise.”  And 
he  burst  out  with  a  wild,  rich  melody,  acting,  in  uncouth  gestures 
and  a  suppressed  tone  of  voice,  the  scene  which  the  words  described  : — 

“An  elk  looked  out  of  the  pine  forest  ; 

He  snufied  up  east,  he  snuffed  down  west, 

Stealthy  and  still. 

“  His  mane  and  his  horns  were  heavy  with  snow ; 

I  laid  my  arrow  across  my  how. 

Stealthy  and  stOl.’^ 

And  then,  quickening  his  voice,  as  his  whole  face  blazed  up  into 
fierce  excitement, — 

“The  bow  it  rattled,  the  arrow  flew, 

It  smote  his  blade-hones  through  and  through, 

Hurrah  1 

“  I  sprung  at  his  throat  like  a  wolf  of  the  wood. 

And  I  warmed  my  hands  in  the  smoking  blood, 

Hurrah  1  ” 

And,  with  a  shout  that  echoed  and  rung  from  wall  to  wall,  and  pealed 
away  above  the  roofs,  he  leaped  to  his  feet  with  a  gesture  and  look  of 
savage  frenzy  which  made  Philammon  recoil.  But  the  passion  was 
gone  in  an  instant,  and  Wulf  sat  down  again,  chuckling  to  himself, — 


THE  PREFECT  TESTED. 


203 


“  There,  that  is  something’  like  a  warrior’s  song.  That  makes  the 
old  blood  spin  along  again  !  But  this  debauching  furnace  of  a  cli¬ 
mate! — no  man  can  keep  his  muscle,  or  his  courage,  or  his  money,  or 
anything  else  in  it.  May  the  gods  curse  the  day  when  first  I  saw 
it!” 

Philaramon  said  nothing,  but  sat  utterly  aghast  at  an  outbreak  so 
unlike  Wulf’s  usual  caustic  reserve  and  stately  self-restraint,  and 
shuddering  at  the  thought  that  it  might  be  an  instance  of  that  de¬ 
moniac  possession  to  which  these  barbarians  were  supposed  by  Chris¬ 
tians  and  by  Neo-Platonists  to  be  peculiarly  subject.  But  the  horror 
was  not  yet  at  its  height  ;  for  in  another  minute  the  doors  of  the 
women’s  court  flew  open,  and,  attracted  by  Wulf’s  shout,  out  poured 
the  whole  Bacchanalian  crew,  with  Orestes,”  crowned  with  flowers, 
and  led  by  the  Amal  and  Pelagia,  reeling  in  the  midst,  wine-cup  in 
hand. 

“  There  is  my  philosopher,  my  preserver,  my  patron  saint !  ”  hic¬ 
coughed  he.  “  Bring  him  to  my  arms,  that  I  may  encircle  his  lovely 
neck  with  pearls  of  India  and  barbaric  gold  !  ” 

“  For  God’s  sake,  let  me  escape,”  whispered  he  to  Wulf,  as  the  rout 
rushed  upon  him.  Wulf  opened  the  door  in  an  instant,  and  he  dashed 
through  it.  As  he  went,  the  old  man  held  out  his  hand, — 

“Come  and  see  me  again,  boy  !  Me  only.  The  old  warrior  will 
not  hurt  you  I  ” 

There  was  a  kindly  tone  in  the  voice,  a  kindly  light  in  the  eye, 
which  made  Philammon  promise  to  obey.  He  glanced  one  look  back 
through  the  gateway  as  he  fled,  and  just  saw  a  wild  whirl  of  Goths 
and  girls,  spinning  madly  round  the  court  in  the  world-old  Teutonic 
waltz,  while,  high  above  their  heads,  in  the  uplifted  arms  of  the 
mighty  Amal,  was  tossing  the  beautiful  figure  of  Pelagia,  tearing  the 
garland  from  her  floating  hair  to  pelt  the  dancers  with  its  roses.  And 
that  might  be  his  sister  !  He  hid  his  face  and  fled,  and  the  gate  shut 
out  the  revelers  from  his  eyes  ;  and  it  is  high  time  that  it  should 
shut  them  out  from  ours  also. 

Some  four  hours  more  had  passed.  The  revelers  were  sleeping 
off  their  wine,  and  the  moon  shining  bright  and  cold  across  the  court, 
when  Wulf  came  out,  carrying  a  heavy  jar  of  wine,  followed  by 
Smid,  a  goblet  in  each  hand. 

‘  ‘  Here,  comrade,  out  into  the  middle  to  catch  a  breath  of  night 
air.  Are  all  the  fools  asleep?” 

“  Every  mother’s  son  of  them.  Ah!  this  is  refreshing  after  that 
room.  What  a  pity  it  is  that  all  men  are  not  born  with  heads  like 
ours  !  ” 

“Very  sad,  indeed,”  said  Wulf,  filling  his  goblet. 

“  What  a  quantity  of  pleasure  they  lose  in  this  life  !  There  they 
are,  snoring  like  hogs.  Now  you  and  I  are  good  to  finish  this  jar, 
at  least.” 

“And  another  after  it,  if  our  talk  is  not  over  by  that  time.” 


204 


HYPATIA. 


Wliy,  are  you  going  to  hold  a  council  of  war?” 

That  is  as  you  take  it.  Now,  look  here,  Smid.  Whomsoever 
I  cannot  trust,  I  suppose  I  may  trust  you,  eh  ?  ” 

“Well  !  ”  quoth  Smid,  surlily,  putting  down  his  goblet,  “  that  is 
a  strange  question  to  ask  of  a  man  who  has  marched,  and  hun¬ 
gered,  and  plundered,  and  conquered,  and  been  well  beaten  by  your 
side  for  five-and-twenty  years,  through  all  lands  between  the  Wesel 
and  Alexandria  !  ” 

“  I  am  growing  old,  I  suppose,  and  so  I  suspect  every  one.  But 
hearken  to  me,  for  between  wine  and  ill-temper,  out  it  must  come. 
You  saw  that  Alruna  woman?” 

“Of  course.” 

“Well?” 

“Well?” 

“  Why,  did  not  you  think  she  would  make  a  wife  for  any  man  ?” 

“Well?” 

‘  ‘  And  why  not  for  our  Amal  ?  ” 

“  That’s  his  concern  as  well  as  hers,  and  hers  as  well  as  ours.” 

“  She  ?  Ought  she  not  to  think  herself  only  too  much  honored  by 
marrying  a  son  of  Odin  ?  Is  she  going  to  be  more  dainty  than  Pla- 
cidia  ?  ” 

“  What  was  good  enough  for  an  emperor’s  daughter  must  be  good 
enough  for  her.” 

“  Good  enough?  And  Adolf  only  a  Balt,  while  Amalric  is  a  full- 
blooded  Amal, — Odin’s  son  by  both  sides.” 

“I  don’t  know  whether  she  would  understand  that.” 

“  Then  we  would  make  her.  Why  not  carry  her  off,  and  marry 
her  to  the  Amal  whether  she  chose  or  not  ?  She  would  be  well  con¬ 
tent  enough  with  him  in  a  week,  I  will  warrant.” 

“But  there  is  Pelagia  in  the  way.” 

“  Put  her  out  of  the  way,  then.” 

“  Impossible.” 

“It  was  this  morning;  a  week  hence  it  may  not  be.  I  heard  a 
promise  made  to-night  which  will  do  it,  if  there  be  the  spirit  of  a 
Goth  left  in  the  poor,  besotted  lad  whom  we  know  of.” 

“  O,  he  is  all  right  at  heart  ;  never  fear  him.  But  what  was  the 
promise  ?  ” 

“  I  will  not  tell  till  it  is  claimed.  I  will  not  be  the  man  to  shame 
my  own  nation  and  the  blood  of  the  gods.  But  if  that  drunken 
prefect  recollects  it, — why,  let  him  recollect  it.  And  what  is  more, 
the  monk-boy  who  was  here  to-night - ” 

“  Ah,  what  a  well-grown  lad  that  is  wasted  !  ” 

“  More  than  suspects — and,  if  his  story  is  true,  I  more  than  suspect 
too — that  Pelagia  is  his  sister.” 

“  His  sister  1  But  what  of  that  ?” 

“  He  wants,  of  course,  to  carry  her  off,  and  make  a  nun  of  her.” 

“  You  would  not  let  him  do  such  a  thing  to  the  poor  child  ?  ” 


THE  PREFECT  TESTED. 


205 


**  If  folks  get  in  my  way,  Smid,  they  must  go  down.  So  much 
the  worse  for  them  .  But  old  Wulf  was  never  turned  back  yet  by 
man  or  beast,  and  he  will  not  be  now.” 

“  After  all,  it  will  serve  the  hussy  right.  But  Amalric?”  ^ 
“  Out  of  sight,  out  of  mind.” 

“  But  they  say  the  prefect  means  to  marry  the  girl.” 

*‘He?  That  scented  ape?  She  would  not  be  such  a  wretch.” 

But  he  does  intend  ;  and  she  intends  too.  It  is  the  talk  of  the 
whole  town.  We  should  have  to  put  him  out  of  the  way  first.” 

“Why  not?  Easy  enough,  and  a  good  riddance  for  Alexandria. 
Yet,  if  we  made  away  with  him,  we  should  be  forced  to  take  the 
city,  too  ;  and  I  doubt  whether  we  have  hands  enough  for  that.” 

“The  guards  might  join  us.  I  will  go  down  to  the  barracks  and 
try  them,  if  you  choose,  to-morrow.  I  am  boon  companion  with  a 
good  many  of  them  already.  But,  after  all,  Prince  Wulf, — of  course 
you  are  always  right ;  we  all  know  that, — but  what’s  the  use  of 
marrying  this  Hypatia  to  the  Amal  ?  ” 

“  Use?”  said  Wulf,  smiting  down  his  goblet  on  the  pavement, 
“  use  ?  you  purblind  old  hamster-rat,  who  think  of  nothing  but  fill¬ 
ing  your  own  cheek-pouches  ! — To  give  him  a  wife  worthy  of  a  hero, 
as  he  is,  in  spite  of  all, — a  wife  who  will  make  him  sober  instead  of 
drunk,  wise  instead  of  a  fool,  daring  instead  of  a  sluggard, — a  wife 
who  can  command  the  rich  people  for  us,  and  give  us  a  hold  here, 
which,  if  once  we  get,  let  us  see  who  will  break  it  1  Why,  with 
those  two  ruling  in  Alexandria,  we  might  be  masters  of  Africa  in 
three  months.  We’d  send  to  Spain  forth©  Wendels,  to  move  on  Car- 
thage  ;  we’d  send  up  the  Adriatic  for  the  Longbeards,  to  land  in 
Pentapolis  ;  we’d  sweep  the  whole  coast  without  losing  a  man,  now 
it  is  drained  of  troops  by  that  fool  Heraclian’s  Roman  expedition  ; 
make  the  Wendels  aud  Longbeards  shake  hands  here  in  Alexandria  ; 

draw  lots  for  their  shares  of  the  coast  ;  and  then  I - ” 

“  And  then  what  ?  ” 

“  Why,  when  we  had  settled  Africa,  I  would  call  out  a  crew  of 
picked  heroes,  and  sail  away  south  for  Asgard, — I’d  try  that  Red  Sea 
this  time, — and  see  Odin  face  to  face,  or  die  searching  for  him.” 

“  Oh  !”  groaned  Smid.  “And  I  suppose  you  would  expect  me  to 
come  too,  instead'  of  letting  me  stop  half-way,  and  settle  there 
among  the  dragons  and  elephants.  Well,  well,  wise  men  are  like 
moorlands, — ride  as  far  as  you  will  on  the  sound  ground,  you  are  sure 
to  come  upon  a  soft  place  at  last.  However,  I  will  go  down  to  the 
guards  to-morrow,  if  my  head  don’t  ache.” 

“  And  I  will  see  the  boy  about  Pelagia.  Drink  to  our  plot  I  ” 

And  the  two  old  iron-heads  drank  on,  till  the  stars  paled  out,  and 
the  eastward  shadows  of  the  cloister  vanished  in  the  blaze  of  dawn. 


'V 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

JEWS  AGAINST  CHRISTIANS. 

The  little  porter,  after  liaving  carried  Arsenius’s  message  to 
Miriam,  liad  run  back  in  search  of  Pliilammon  and  his  foster-father  ; 
and  not  finding  them,  had  spent  the  evening  in  such  frantic  rush- 
ings  to  and  fro  as  produced  great  doubts  of  his  sanity  among  the 
people  of  the  quarter.  At  last  hunger  sent  him  home  to  supper  ;  at 
which  meal  he  tried  to  find  vent  for  his  excited  feelings  in  his 
favorite  employment  of  beating  his  wife.  Whereon  Miriam’s  two 
Syrian  slave-girls,  attracted  by  her  screams,  came  to  the  rescue, 
-  threw  a  pail  of  water  ovei  him,  and  turned  him  out  of  doors.  He, 
nothing  discomfited,  likened  himself  smilingly  to  Socrates  conquered 
by  Xantippe  ;  and,  philosophically  yielding  to  circumstances,  hopped 
about  like  a  tame  magpie  for  a  couple  of  hours  at  the  entrance  of  the 
alley,  pouring  forth  a  stream  of  light  raillery  on  the  passers-by, 
which  several  times  endangered  his  personal  safety  ;  till  at  last  Phil- 
ammon,  hurrying  breathlessly  home,  rushed  into  his  arms. 

“  Hush  !  Hither  with  me  !  Your  star  still  prospers.  She  calls 
for  you.” 

“Who?” 

‘  ‘  Miriam  herself.  Be  secret  as  the  grave.  You  she  will  see  and 
speak  with.  The  message  of  Arsenius  she  rejected  in  language 
which  it  is  unnecessary  for  philosophic  lips  to  repeat.  Come  ;  but 
give  her  good  words, — as  are  fit  to  an  enchantress  who  can  stay 
the  stars  in  their  courses,  and  command  the  spirits  of  the  third 
heaven.” 

Pliilammon  hurried  home  with  Eudaemon.  Little  cared  he  now 

for  Hypatia’s  warning  against  Miriam . Was  he  not  in  search  of  a 

sister  ? 

“So,  you  wretch,  you  are  back  again  !”  cried  one  of  the  girls, 
as  they  knocked  at  the  outer  door  of  Miriam’s  apartments. 
“  What  do  you  mean  by  bringing  young  men  here  at  this  time  of 
night  ?  ” 

“  Better  go  down  and  beg  pardon  of  that  poor  wife  of  yours.  She 
I  has  been  weeping  and  praying  for  you  to  her  crucifix  all  the  evening, 
you  ungrateful  little  ape  !  ” 

“Female  superstitions, — but  I  forgive  her . Peace,  barbarian 

women  !  I  bring  this  youthful  philosopher  hither  by  your  mis¬ 
tress’s  own  appointment.  ” 

(  206  ) 


JEWS  AGAINST  CHRISTIANS,  207 

“He  must  wait,  then,  in  the  anteroom.  There  is  a  gentleman 
with  my  mistress  at  present.” 

So  Philammon  waited  in  the  dark,  din^ry  anteroom,  luxuriously 
furnished  with  faded  tapestry,  and  divans  which  lined  the  walls  ; 
and  fretted  and  fidgeted,  while  the  two  girls  watched  him  over  their 
embroidery  out  of  the  corners  of  their  eyes,  and  agreed  that  he  was 
a  very  stupid  person  for  showing  no  inclination  to  return  their 
languishing  glances. 

In  the  meanwhile,  Miriam,  within,  was  listening,  with  a  smile  of 
grim  delight,  to  a  swarthy  and  weather-beaten  young  Jew. 

“  I  knew,  mother  in  Israel,  that  all  depended  on  my  pace  ;  and 
night  and  day  I  rode  from  Ostia  toward  Tarentum  :  but  the  messen¬ 
ger  of  the  uncircumcised  was  better  mounted  than  I ;  I  therefore 
bribed  a  certain  slave  to  lame  his  horse,  and  passed  him  by  a  whole 
sJage  on  the  second  day.  Nevertheless,  by  night  the  Philistine  had 
caught  me  up  again,  the  evil  angels  helping  him  ;  and  my  soul  was 
mad  within  me.” 

“  And  what  then,  Jonadab  Bar-Zebudah  ?  ” 

“  I  bethought  me  of  Ehud,  and  of  Joab  also,  when  he  was  pursued 
by  Asahel,  and  considered  much  of  the  lawfulness  of  the  deed,  not 
being  a  nian  of  blood.  Nevertheless,  we  were  together  in  the  dark¬ 
ness,  and  I  smote  him.” 

Miriam  clapped  her  hands. 

“  Then,  putting  on  his  clothes,  and  taking  his  letters  and  creden¬ 
tials,  as  was  but  reasonable,  I  passed  myself  off  for  the  messenger 
of  the  emperor,  and  so  rode  the  rest  of  that  journey  at  the  expense 
of  the  heathen  ;  and  I  hereby  return  you  the  balance  saved.” 

“Never  mind  the  balance.  Keep  it,  thou  worthy  son  of  Jacob. 
What  next  ?  ” 

“  When  I  came  to  Tarentum,  I  sailed  in  the  galley  which  I  had 
chartered  from  certain  sea-robbers.  Valiant  men  they  were,  never¬ 
theless,  and  kept  true  faith  with  me.  For  when  we  had  come  half¬ 
way,  rowing  with  all  our  might,  behold  another  galley  coming  in  our 
wake  and  about  to  pass  us  by,  which  I  knew  for  an  Alexandrian,  as 
did  the  captain  also,  who  assured  me  that  she  had  come  from  hence 
to  Brundusiurn  with  letters  from  Orestes.” 

“  Well?” 

“  It  seemed  to  me  both  base  to  be  passed,  and  more  base  to  waste 
all  the  expense  wherewith  you  and  our  elders  had  charged  them¬ 
selves  ;  so  I  took  counsel  with  the  man  of  blood,  offering  him,  over 
and  above  our  bargain,  two  hundred  gold  pieces  of  my  own,  which 
please  to  pay  to  my  account  with  Rabbi  Ezekiel,  who  lives  by  the 
Water-gate  in  Pelusium.  Then  the  pirates,  taking  counsel,  agreed 
to  run  down  the  enemy  ;  for  our  galley  was  a  sharp-beaked  Libur- 
nian,  while  theirs  was  only  a  light  messenger  trireme.” 

“  And  you  did  it  ?  ” 

“  Else  had  I  not  been  here.  They  were  delivered  into  our  hands, 


208  IITPATIA. 

so  that  we  struck  them  full  in  mid-length,  and  they  sunk  like  Pha¬ 
raoh  and  his  host.” 

“  So  perish  all  the  enemies  of  the  nation  !  ”  cried  Miriam.  And 
now  it  is  impossible,  you  say,  for  fresh  news  to  arrive  for  these  ten 
days  ? ” 

‘  ‘  Impossible,  the  captain  assured  me,  owing  to  the  rising  of  the 
wind,  and  the  signs  of  southerly  storm.” 

“  Here,  take  this  letter  for  the  Chief  Rabbi,  and  the  blessing  of  a 
mother  in  Israel.  Thou  hast  played  the  man  for  thy  people  ;  and 
thou  shalt  go  to  the  grave  full  of  years  and  honors,  with  men- 
servants  and  maid-servants,  gold  and  silver,  children  and  children’s 
children,  with  thy  foot  on  the  necks  of  heathens,  and  the  blessing  of 
Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob,  to  eat  of  the  goose  which  is  fattening  in 
the  desert,  and  the  Leviathan  which  lieth  in  the  great  sea,  to  be  meat 
for  all  true  Israelites  at  the  last  day.” 

And  the  Jew  turned  and  went  out,  perhaps,  in  his  simple  fanati¬ 
cism,  the  happiest  man  in  Egypt  at  that  moment. 

He  passed  out  through  the  antechamber,  leering  at  the  slave-girls, 
and  scowling  at  Philammon ;  and  the  youth  was  ushered  into  the 
presence  of  Miriam. 

She  sat,  coiled  up  like  a  snake,  on  a  divan,  writing  busily  in  a  tab¬ 
let  upon  her  knees,  while  on  the  cushions  beside  her  glittered  splen¬ 
did  jewels,  which  she  had  been  fingering  over  as  a  child  might  its 
toys.  She  did  not  look  up  for  a  few  minutes  ;  and  Philammon  could 
not  help,  in  spite  of  his  impatience,  looking  round  the  little  room, 
and  contrasting  its  dirty  splendor,  and  heavy  odor  of  wine,  and  food, 
and  perfumes,  with  the  sunny  grace  and  cleanliness  of  Greek  houses. 
Against  the  walls  stood  presses  and  chests  fretted  with  fantastic 
Oriental  carving  ;  illuminated  rolls  of  parchment  lay  in  heaps  in  a 
corner  ;  a  lamp  of  strange  form  hung  from  the  ceiling,  and  shed  a 
dim  and  lurid  light  upon  an  object  which  chilled  the  youth’s  blood 
for  a  moment, — a  bracket  against  the  wall,  on  which,  in  a  plate  of 
gold,  engraven  with  mystic  signs,  stood  the  mummy  of  an  infant’s 
head  ;  one  of  those  teraphim,  from  which,  as  Philammon  knew,  the 
sorcerers  of  the  East  professed  to  evoke  oracular  responses 

At  last,  she  looked  up,  and  spoke  in  a  shrill,  harsh  voice. 

“  Well,  my  fair  boy,  and  what  do  you  want  with  the  poor  old 
proscribed  Jewess  ?  Have  you  coveted  yet  any  of  the  pretty  things 
which  she  has  had  the  wit  to  make  her  slave-demons  save  from  the 
Christian  robbers  ?  ” 

Philammon’s  tale  was  soon  told.  The  old  woman  listened,  watch¬ 
ing  him  intently  with  her  burning  eye  ;  and  then  answered  slowly, — 

“  Well,  and  what  if  you  are  a  slave?” 

“  Am  I  one,  then  ?  Am  I?” 

“  Of  course  you  are.  ^Arsenius  spoke  truth.  I  saw  him  buy  you 
at  Ravenna,  just  fifteen  years  ago.  I  bought  your  sister  at  the  same 
time.  She  is  two-and-twenty  now.  You  were  four  years  younger 
than  her,  I  should  say.”  _ 


JEW  AGAINST  CnmSTIANS. 

0  heavens  !  and  you  know  my  sister  still  1  Is  she  Pelagia  ?  ” 

"  You  were  a  pretty  boy,”  went  on  the  hag,  apparently  not  hear¬ 
ing  him.  “  If  I  had  thought  you  were  going  to  grow  up  as  beauti¬ 
ful  and  as  clever  as  you  are,  I  would  have  bought  you  myself.  The 
Goths  were  just  marching,  and  Arsenius  gave  only  eighteen  gold 
pieces  for  you, — or  twenty, — I  am  growing  old,  and  forget  every¬ 
thing,  I  think.  But  there  would  have  been  the  expense  of  your 
education,  and  your  sister  cost  me  in  training — O  what  sums  !  Not 
that  she  was  not  worth  the  money, — no,  no,  the  darling  !  ” 

And  you  know  where  she  is? — O  tell  me, — ^in  the  name  of  mercy, 
tell  me  !  ” 

“  Why,  then  ?  ” 

“  Why,  then?  Have  you  not  the  heart  of  a  human  being  in  you? 
Is  she  not  my  sister  ?  ” 

“  Well?  You  have  done  very  well  for  fifteen  years  without  your 
sister, — why  can  you  not  do  as  well  now  ?  You  don’t  recollect  her, — 
you  don’t  love  her.” 

“  Not  love  her?  I  would  die  for  her, — die  for  you,  if  you  will  but 
help  me  to  see  her  !  ” 

“You  would,  would  you?  And  if  I  brought  you  to  her,  what 
then  ?  What  if  she  were  Pelagia  herself,  what  then  ?  She  is  happy 
enough  now,  and  rich  enough.  Could  you  make  her  happier  or 
richer  ?  ” 

“  Can  you  ask?  I  must — I  will — reclaim  her  from  the  infamy  in 
which  I  am  sure  she  lives.” 

“Ah  ha!  sir  monk  !  I  expected  as  much.  I  know,  none  knows 
better,  what  those  fine  words  mean.  The  burned  child  dreads  the 
fire  ;  but  the  burned  old  woman  quenches  it,  you  will  find.  Now 
listen.  I  do  not  say  that  you  shall  not  see  her, — I  do  not  say  that 
Pelagia  herself  is  not  the  woman  whom  you  seek, — but — you  are  in 
my  power.  Don’t  frown  and  pout.  I  can  deliver  you  as  a  slave  to 
Arsenius  when  I  choose.  One  word  from  me  to  Orestes,  and  you  are 
in  fetters  as  a  fugitive.” 

‘  ‘  I  will  escape  1  ”  cried  he,  fiercely. 

“  Escape  me  ?” — She  laughed,  pointing  to  the  teraph, — “  Me,  who, 
if  you  fied  beyond  Kaf,  or  dived  to  the  depths  of  the  ocean,  could 
make  these  dead  lips  confess  where  you  were,  and  command  demons 
to  bear  you  back  to  me  upon  their  wings  1  Escape  me  1  Better  to 
obey  me,  and  see  your  sister.” 

Philammon  shuddered,  and  submitted.  The  spell  of  the  woman’s 
eye,  the  terror  of  her  words,  which  he  half  believed,  and  the  agony 
of  longing,  conquered  him,  and  he  gasped  out, — 

“  I  will  obey  you, — only — only - ” 

“  Only  you  are  not  quite  a  man  yet,  but  half  a  monk  still,  eh?  I 
must  know  that  before  I  help  you,  my  pretfj  boy.  Are  you  a  monk 
still,  or  a  man  ?  ” 

“  What  do  you  mean  ?^' 


STPATIA. 


gld 


“Ah,  ha,  ha  !”  laughed  she,  shrilly.  “And  these  Christian  dogs 
don’t  know  what  a  man  means  ?  Are  you  a  monk,  then  ?  leaving  the 
man  alone,  as  above  your  understanding.” 

“  I? — I  am  a  student  of  philosophy.” 

“But  no  man?” 

“I  am  a  man,  I  suppose.” 

“  I  don’t  ;  if  you  had  been,  you  would  have  been  making  love  like 
a  man  to  that  heathen  woman  many  a  month  ago.” 

“ I — to  her?” 

“Yes,  I — to  her  !”  said  Miriam,  coarsely  imitating  his  tone  of 
shocked  humility.  “  I,  the  poor,  penniless  boy-scholar,  to  her,  the 
great,  rich,  wise,  worshiped  she-philosopher,  who  holds  the  sacred 
keys  of  the  inner  shrine  of  the  east  wind, — and  just  because  I  am  a 
man,  and  the  handsomest  man  in  Alexandria,  and  she  a  woman,  and 
the  vainest  woman  in  Alexandria,  and  therefore  I  am  stronger  than 
she,  and  can  twist  her  round  my  finger,  and  bring  her  to  her  knees 
at  my  feet  when  I  like,  as  soon  as  I  open  my  eyes,  and  discover  that 
I  am  a  man.  Eh,  boy  ?  Did  she  ever  teach  you  that  among  her 
mathematics  and  metaphysics,  and  gods  and  goddesses?  ” 

Philammon  stood  blushing  scarlet.  The  sweet  poison  had  entered, 
and  every  vein  glowed  with  it  for  the  first  time  in  his  life.  Miriam 
saw  her  advantage. 

“  There,  there, — don’t  be  frightened  at  your  new  lesson.  After  all, 
I  liked  you  from  the  first  moment  I  saw  you,  and  asked  the  teraph 
about  you,  and  I  got  an  answer, — such  an  answer  !  You  shall  know 
it  some  day.  At  all  events,  it  set  the  poor  old  soft-hearted  Jewess  on 
throwing  away  her  money.  Did  you  ever  guess  from  whom  your 
monthly  gold-piece  came?  ” 

Philammon  started,  and  Miriam  burst  into  loud,  shrill  laughter. 

“  From  Hypatia,  I  ’ll  warrant  !  From  the  fair  Greek  woman,  of 
course, — vain  child  that  you  are, — never  thinking  of  the  poor  old 
Jewess.” 

“  And  did  you  ?  did  you  ?  ”  gasped  Philammon.  “  Have  I  to  thank 
you,  then,  for  that  strange  generosity  ?  ” 

“  Not  to  thank  me,  but  to  obey  me  ;  for  mind,  I  can  prove  your 
debt  to  me,  every  obol,  and  claim  it  if  I  choose.  But  don’t  fear  ;  I 
won’t  be  hard  on  you,  just  because  you  are  in  my  power.  I  hate  every 
one  who  is  not  so.  As  soon  as  I  have  a  hold  on  them,  I  begin  to 
love  them.  Old  folks,  like  children,  are  fond  of  their  own  play¬ 
things.  ” 

“  And  I  am  yours,  then?”  said  Philammon,  fiercely. 

“  You  are  indeed,  my  beautiful  boy,”  answered  she,  looking  up  with 
so  insinuating  a  smile  that  he  could  not  be  angry.  “  After  all,  1  know 
how  to  toss  my  balls  gently, — and  for  these  forty  years  I  have  only 
lived  to  make  young  folks  happy  ;  so  you  need  not  be  afraid  of  the 
poor  soft-hearted  old  woman.  Now,  you  saved  Orestes’s  life  yester- 


JEWS  AGAmSl  CBUISTlAm. 


m 

How  did  you  find  out  that  ?  ” 

“  I  ?  I  know  everything.  I  know  what  the  swallows  say  when 
they  pass  each  other  on  the  wing,  and  what  the  fishes  think  of  in  the 
summer  sea.  You,  too,  will  be  able  to  guess  some  day  without  the 
teraph’s  help.  But  in  the  meantime  you  must  enter  Orestes’s  service. 
Why  ? — what  are  you  hesitating  about  ?  Do  you  not  know  that  you 
are  high  in  his  favor?  He  will  make  you  secretary, — raise  you  to  be 
chamberlain  some  day,  if  you  know  how  to  make  good  use  of  your 
fortune.” 

Philammon  stood  in  astonished  silence  ;  and  at  last, — 

“  Servant  to  that  man  ?  What  care  I  for  him  or  his  honors  ?  Why  do 
you  tantalize  me  thus  ?  I  have  no  Avish  on  earth  but  to  see  my  sister  !  ” 

“  You  will  be  far  more  likely  to  see  her  if  you  belong  to  the  court 
of  a  great  officer, — perhaps  more  than  an  officer, — than  if  yon  remain 
a  penniless  monk.  Not  that  I  believe  you.  Your  only  Avish  on  earth, 
eh  ?  Do  you  not  care,  then,  ever  to  see  the  fair  Hypatia  again  ?” 

“  I  ?  Why  should  I  not  see  her  ?  Am  I  not  her  pupil  ?  ” 

“  She  Avill  not  have  pupils  much  longer,  my  child.  If  you  wish  to 
hear  her  wisdom — and  much  good  may  it  do  you — you  must  go  for  it 
henceforth  someAvhat  nearer  to  Orestes’s  palace  than  the  lecture-room 
is.  Ah  !  you  start.  Have  I  found  you  an  argument  noAV?  No, — ask 
no  questions.  I  explain  nothing  to  monks.  But  take  these  letters  ; 
to-morrow  morning  at  the  third  hour  go  to  Orestes’s  palace,  and  ask 
for  his  secretary  ,  Ethan  the  Chaldee.  Say  boldly  that  you  bring  im¬ 
portant  news  of  state  ;  and  then  follow  your  star  :  it  is  a  fairer  one 
you  fancy.  Go  !  obey  me,  or  you  see  no  sister.” 

Philammon  felt  himself  trapped  ;  but,  after  all,  what  might  not 
this  strange  woman  do  for  him  ?  It  seemed,  if  not  his  only  path,  still 
his  nearest  path  to  Pelagia  ;  and  in  the  meanwhile  he  was  in  the 
hag’s  power,  and  he  must  submit  to  his  fate  ;  so  he  took  the  letters, 
and  went  out. 

“And  so  you  think  that  you  are  going  to  have  her?”  chuckled 
Miriam  to  herself,  when  Philammon  went  out.  “  To  make  a  peni¬ 
tent  of  her,  eh  ? — a  nun,  or  a  she-hermit  ;  to  set  her  to  appease  your 
God  by  crawling  on  all-fours  among  the  mummies  for  twenty  years, 
with  a  chain  round  her  neck  and  a  clog  at  her  ankle,  fancying  herself  all 
the  Avhile  the  bride  of  the  Nazarene  ?  And  you  think  that  old  Miriam 
is  going  to  give  her  up  to  you  for  that?  No,  no,  sir  monk  !  Better 
she  were  dead  !.  .  .  .Follow  your  dainty  bait  ! — follow  it,  as  the  don¬ 
key  does  the  grass  which  his  driver  offers  him,  always  an  inch  from 

his  nose . You  in  my  power  ! — and  Orestes  in  my  power  !....!  must 

negotiate  that  new  loan  to-morroAv,  I  suppose . I  shall  never  be 

paid.  The  dog  will  ruin  me,  after  all  !  How  much  is  it,  now?  Let 
me  see.”.  . .  .And  she  began  fumbling  in  her  escritoire,  over  bonds 
and  notes  of  hand.  “I  shall  never  be  paid:  but  poAver  ! — to  have 
power  !  To  see  those  heathen  slaA^es  and  Christian  hounds  plotting 
and  vaporing,  and  fancying  themselves  the  masters  of  the  world,  and 


/ 


S[tPATlA. 


m 

never  dreaming  that  we  are  pulling  tlie  strings,  and  that  they  areou? 
puppets  ! — we,  the  children  of  the  promises, — we.  The  Nation, — we, 
the  seed  of  Abraham  !  Poor  fools  !  I  could  almost  pity  them,  as  I 
think  of  their  faces  when  Messiah  comes,  and  they  find  out  who  were 

the  true  lords  of  the  world,  after  all ! . He  must  he  Emperor  of  the 

South,  though,  that  Orestes  ;  he  must,  though  I  have  to  lend  him 
Raphael’s  jewels  to  make  him  so.  For  he  must  marry  the  Greek 

woman.  He  shall.  She  hates  him,  of  course . So  much  the  deeper 

revenge  for  me.  And  she  loves  that  monk.  I  saw  it  in  her  eyes  there 
in  the  garden.  So  much  the  better  for  me,  too.  He  will  dangle  will¬ 
ingly  enough  at  Orestes’s  heels  for  the  sake  of  being  near  her, — poor 
fool  !  We  will  make  him  secretary,  or  chamberlain.  He  has  wit 
enough  for  it,  they  say,  or  for  anything.  So  Orestes  and  he  shall  be 
the  two  jaws  of  my  pincers,  to  squeeze  what  I  want  out  of  that  Greek 
Jezebel . And  then — then  for  the  black  agate  !” 

Was  the  end  of  her  speech  a  bathos?  Perhaps  not  ;  for  as  she 
spoke  the  last  word,  she  drew  from  her  bosom,  where  it  hung  round 
her  neck  by  a  chain,  a  broken  talisman,  exactly  similar  to  the  one 
■which  she  coveted  so  fiercely,  and  looked  at  it  long  and  lovingly, — 
kissed  it, — wept  over  it, — spoke  to  it, — fondled  it  in  her  arms  as  a 
mother  would  a  child, — murmured  over  it  snatches  of  lullabies  ;  and 
her  grim,  withered  features  grew  softer,  purer,  grander ;  and  rose 
ennobled,  for  a  moment,  to  their  long-lost  might-have-been,  to  that 
personal  idea  which  every  soul  brings  with  it  into  the  world,  which 
shines  dim  and  potential,  in  the  face  of  every  sleeping  babe,  before 
it  has  been  scarred  and  distorted  and  incrusted  in  the  long  tragedy  of 
life.  Sorceress  she  was,  pander  and  slave-dealer,  steeped  to  the  lips 
in  falsehood,  ferocity,  and  avarice  ;  yet  that  paltry  stone  brought 
home  to  her  some  thought,  true,  spiritual,  impalpable,  unmarketable, 
before  which  all  her  treasures  and  all  her  ambition  w^ere  as  worthless 
in  her  own  eyes  as  they  were  in  the  eyes  of  the  angels  of  God. 

But  little  did  Miriam  think  that  at  the  same  moment  a  brawny, 
clownish  monk  was  standing  in  Cyril’s  private  chamber,  and,  indulged 
with  the  special  honor  of  a  cup  of  good  wine  in  the  patriarch’s  very 
presence,  was  telling  to  him  and  Arsenins  the  following  history  : — 

“  So  I,  finding  that  the  Jews  had  chartered  this  pirate  ship,  went  to 
the  master  thereof,  and  finding  favor  in  his  eyes,  hired  myself  to  row 
therein,  being  sure,  from  what  I  had  overheard  from  the  Jews,  that 
she  was  destined  to  bring  the  news  to  Alexandria  as  quickly  as 
possible.  Therefore,  fulfilling  the  work  which  his  Holiness  had 
intrusted  to  my  incapacity,  I  embarked,  and  rowed  continually  among 
the  rest ;  and  being  unskilled  in  such  labor,  received  many  curses  and 
stripes  in  the  cause* of  the  Church, — the  which  I  trust  are  laid  to  my 
account  hereafter.  Moreover,  Satan  entered  into  me,  desiring  to  slay 
me,  and  almost  tore  me  asunder,  so  that  I  vomited  much,  and  loathed 
all  manner  of  meat.  Nevertheless,  I  rowed  on  valiantly,  being  such 
as  I  am,  vomiting  continually,  till  the  heathens  were  moved  with 


JEWS  AGAINST  CHRISTIANS. 


m 

wonder,  and  forbore  to  beat  me,  giving  me  strong  liquors  in  pity  ; 
wherefore  I  rowed  all  the  more  valiantly  day  and  night,  trusting  that 
by  my  unworthiness  the  cause  of  the  Catholic  Church  might  be  in 
some  slight  wise  assisted.” 

“  And  so  it  is,”  quoth  Cyril.  “  Why  do  you  not  sit  down,  man  ?  ” 

“  Pardon  me,”  quoth  the  monk,  with  a  piteous  gesture  ;  “  of  sit¬ 
ting,  as  of  all  carnal  pleasure,  cometh  satiety  at  the  last.  ” 

“  And  now,”  said  Cyril,  “  what  reward  am  I  to  give  you  for  your 
good  service  ?  ” 

“It  is  reward  enough  to  know  that  I  have  done  good  service. 
Nevertheless,  if  the  holy  patriarch  be  so  inclined  without  reason, 
there  is  an  ancient  Christian,  my  mother  according  to  the  -flesh - ” 

“  Come  to  me  to-morrow,  and  she  shall  be  well  seen  to.  And  mind, 
— look  to  it,  if  I  make  you  not  a  deacon  of  the  city,  when  I  promote 
Peter.” 

The  monk  kissed  his  superior’s  hand,  and  withdrew.  Cyril  turned 
to  Arsenins,  betrayed  for  once  into  geniality  by  his  delight,  and,  smit¬ 
ing  his  thigh, — 

‘•'We  have  beaten  the  heathen  for  once,  eh?”  And  then,  in  the 
usual  artificial  tone  of  an  ecclesiastic, — “  And  what  would  my  father 
recommend  in  furtherance  of  the  advantage  so  mercifully  thrown 
into  our  hand  ?  ” 

Arsenins  was  silent. 

“  I,”  went  on  Cyril,  “  should  be  inclined  to  announce  the  news  this 
very  night,  in  my  sermon.” 

Arsenins  shook  his  head. 

“  Why  not  ?  why  not  ?  ”  said  Cyril,  impatiently. 

“  Better  to  keep  it  secret  till  others  tell  it.  Reserved  knowledge  is 
always  reserved  strength  ;  and  if  the  man,  as  I  hope  he  does  not,  in¬ 
tends  evil  to  the  Church,  let  him  commit  himself  before  you  use 
your  knowledge  against  him.  True,  you  may  have  a  scruple  of  con¬ 
science  as  to  the  lawfulness  of  allowing  a  sin  which  you  might  prevent. 
To  me  it  seems  that  the  sin  lies  in  the  will  rather  than  in  the  deed, 
and  that  sometimes — I  only  say  sometimes — it  may  be  a  means  of 
saving  the  sinner  to  allow  his  root  of  iniquity  to  bear  fruit,  and  fill 
him  with  his  own  devices.” 

“  Dangerous  doctrine,  my  father.” 

“  Like  all  sound  doctrine, — a  savor  of  life  or  of  death,  according  as 
it  is  received.  I  have  not  said  it  to  the  multitude,  but  to  a  discerning 
brother.  And  even  politically  speaking, — let  him  commit  himself,  if 
he  be  really  plotting  rebellion,  and  then  speak,  and  smite  his  Babel 
tower.” 

“You  think,  then,  that  he  does  not  know  of  Heraclian’s  defeat 
already  ?  ”  ^ 

“  If  he  does,  he  will  keep  it  secret  from  the  people  ;  and  our  chancen 
of  turning  them  suddenly  will  be  nearly  the  same.” 

“  Good.  After  all  the  existence  of  the  Catholic  Church  in  Alex 


HYPATIA. 

andria  depends  on  this  struggle,  and  it  is  well  to  be  wary.  Be  it  so. 
It  is  well  for  me  that  I  have  you  for  an  adviser.” 

And  thus  Cyril,  usually  the  most  impatient  and  intractable  of  plot¬ 
ters,  gave  in,  as  wise  men  should,  to  a  wiser  man  than  himself,  and 
made  up  his  mind  to  keep  the  secret,  and  to  command  the  monk  to 
keep  it  also. 

Philammon,  after  a  sleepless  night,  and  a  welcome  visit  to  the 
public  baths,  which  the  Roman  tyranny,  wiser  in  its  generation  than 
modern  liberty,  provided  so  liberally  for  its  victims,  set  forth  to  the 
prefect’s  palace,  and  gave  his  message  ;  but  Orestes,  who  had  been 
of  late  astonishing  the  Alexandrian  public  by  an  unwonted  display  of 
alacrity,  was  already  in  the  adjoining  Basilica.  Thither  the  youth 
was  conducted  by  an  apparitor,  and  led  up  the  center  of  the  enormous 
hall,  gorgeous  with  frescoes  and  colored  marbles,  and  surrounded  by 
aisles  and  galleries,  in  which  the  inferior  magistrates  were  hearing 
causes,  and  doing  such  justice  as  the  complicated  technicalities  of 
Roman  law  chose  to  mete  out.  Through  a  crowd  of  anxious  loungers 
the  youth  passed  to  the  apse  of  the  upper  end,  in  which  the  prefect’s 
throne  stood  empty,  and  then  turned  into  a  side  chamber,  where  he 
found  liimself  alone  with  the  secretary,  a  portly  Chaldee  eunuch,  with  a 
sleek  pale  face,  small  pig’s  eyes,  and  an  enormous  turban.  The  man 
of  pen  and  paper  took  the  letter,  opened  it  with  solemn  deliberation, 
and  then,  springing  to  his  feet,  darted  out  of  the  room  in  most  un¬ 
dignified  haste,  leaving  Philammon  to  wait  and  wonder.  In  half 
an  hour  he  returned,  his  little  eyes  grown  big  with  some  great  idea. 

“  Youth  !  your  star  is  in  the  ascendant  ;  you  are  the  fortunate 
bearer  of  fortunate  news  !  His  excellency  himself  commands  your 
presence.”  And  the  two  went  out. 

In  another  chamber,  the  door  of  which  was  guarded  by  armed  men, 
Orestes  was  walking  up  and  down  in  high  excitement,  looking  some¬ 
what  the  worse  for  the  events  of  the  past  night,  and  making  occa¬ 
sional  appeals  to  a  gold  goblet  which  stood  on  the  table. 

“Ha!  No  other  than  my  preserver  himself  I  Boy,  I  will  make 
your  fortune.  Miriam  says  that  you  wish  to  enter  my  service.” 

Philammon,  not  knowing  what  to  say,  thought  the  best  answer 
would  be  to  bow  as  low  as  he  could. 

“Ab,ha!  Graceful,  but  not  quite  according  to  etiquette.  You 
will  soon  teach  him,  eh.  Secretary?  Now  to  business.  Hand  me  the 
notes  to  sign  and  seal.  To  the  Prefect  of  the  Stationaries - -  ” 

“Here,  your  excellency.” 

“  To  the  Prefect  of  the  Corn-market. — How  many  wheat-ships  have 
you  ordered  to  be  unladen? ” 

“  Two,  your  excellency.” 

“  Well  that  will  be  largess  enough  for  the  time  being.  To  the 
defender  of  the  Plebs.-F— The  Devil  break  his  neck  1  ” 

“He  may  be  trusted,  most  noble  ;  he  is  bitterly  jealous  of  Cyril’s 
influence.  And,  moreover,  he  owes  my  insignificance  much  money.” 

“  Good  I  Now  the  notes  to  the  Gaol-masters,  about  the  gladiators.” 


JEWS  AGAINST  CERI8TIAN8. 


‘‘Here,  your  excellency.” 

“  To  Hypatia.  No.  I  will  lionor  my  bride  elect  with  my  own 
illustrious  presence.  As  I  live,  here  is  a  morning’s  work  for  a  man 
with  a  racking  headache  !  ” 

“Your  excellency  has  the  strength  of  seven.  May  you  live  for. 
ever  !  ” 

And  really,  Orestes’s  power  of  getting  through  business,  when  he 
chose,  was  surprising  enough.  A  cold  head  and  a  colder  heart  make 
many  things  easy. 

But  Philammon’s  whole  soul  was  fixed  on  those  words.  “His 
bride  elect  !”. . .  .Was  it  that  Miriam’s  hints  of  the  day  before  had 
raised  some  selfish  vision,  or  was  it  pity  and  horror  at  such  a  fate  for 
her, — for  his  idol  ? — But  he  passed  five  minutes  in  a  dream,  from 
which  he  was  awakened  by  the  sound  of  another  and  still  dearer 
name. 

“  And  now,  for  Pelagia.  We  can  but  try.” 

“  Your  excellency  might  offend  the  Goth.” 

“  Curse  the  Goth  !  He  shall  have  his  choice  of  all  the  beauties  in 
Alexandria,  and  be  Count  of  Pentapolis  if  he  likes.  But  a  spectacle 
I  must  have  ;  and  no  one  but  Pelagia  can  dance  Y enus  Anadyo- 
mene.” 

Philammon’s  blood  rushed  to  his  heart,  and  then  back  again  to  his 
brow,  as  he  reeled  with  horror  and  shame. 

“  The  people  will  be  mad  with  joy  to  see  her  on  the  stage  once 
more.  Little  they  thought,  the  brutes,  how  I  was  plotting  for  their 
amusement,  even  when  as  drunk  as  Silenus.” 

“  Your  nobility  only  lives  for  the  good  of  your  slaves.” 

“Here,  boy  !  So  fair  a  lady  requires  a  fair  messenger.  You  shall 
enter  on  my  service  at  once,  and  carry  this  letter  to  Pelagia.  Why  ! 
—why  do  you  not  come  and  take  it  ?  ” 

“To  Pelagia?”  gasped  the  boy.  “In  the  theater?  Publicly? 
7enus  Anadyomene?” 

Yes,  fool !  Were  you,  too,  drunk  last  night,  after  all  ?” 

>  *  ‘  She  is  my  sister  !  ” 

“  Well,  and  what  of  that?  Not  that  I  believe  you,  you  villain 
So  !  ”  said  Orestes,  who  comprehended  the  matter  in  an  instant. 
“Apparitors!” 

The  door  opened,  and  the  guard  appeared. 

“  Here  is  a  good  boy  who  is  inclined  to  make  a  fool  of  himself. 
Keep  him  out  of  harm’s  way  for  a  few  days.  But  don’t  hurt  him  ; 
for,  after  all,  he  saved  my  life  yesterday,  when  you  scoundrels  ran 
away.” 

And,  without  further  ado,  the  hapless  youth  was  collared,  and  led 
down  a  vaulted  passage  into  the  guard-room,  amid  the  jeers  of  the 
guard,  who  seemed  only  to  owe  him  a  grudge  for  his  yesterday’s 
prowess,  and  showed  great  alacrity  in  fitting  him  with  a  heavy  set 
of  irons  ;  which  done,  he  was  thrust  head  foremost  into  a  cell  of  the 
prison,  locked  in,  and  left  to  his  meditations. 


CHAPTER  XX. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

'^BUT,  fairest  Hypatia,  conceive  yourself  struck  in  tlie  face  by* 
great  stone,  several  hundred  howling  wretches  leaping  up  at  you  like 
wild  beasts, — two  minutes  more,  and  you  are  torn  limb  from  limb. 
What  would  you  do  in  such  a  case?” 

“  Let  them  tear  me  limb  from  iimb,  and  die  as  I  have  lived.” 

“  Ah,  but -  When  it  came  to  fact,  and  death  was  staring  you 

in  the  face  ?  ” 

And  why  should  man  fear  death  ?  ” 

“Ahem  1  No,  not  death,  of  course  ;  but  the  act  of  dying.  That 
may  be,  surely,  under  such  circumstances,  to  say  the  least,  disa¬ 
greeable.  If  our  ideal,  Julian  the  Great,  found  a  little  dissimulation 
necessary,  and  was  even  a  better  Christian  than  I  have  ever  pre¬ 
tended  to  be,  till  he  found  himself  able  to  throw  off  the  mask,  why 
should  not  I  ?  Consider  me  as  a  lower  being  than  yourself, — one  of  the 
herd,  if  you  will  ;  but  a  penitent  member  thereof,  who  comes  to 
make  the  fullest  possible  reparation,  by  doing  any  desperate  deed  on 
which  you  may  choose  to  nut  him,  and  prove  myself  as  able  and 
willing,  if  once  I  have  the  power,  as  Julian  himself.” 

Such  was  the  conversation  which  passed  between  Hypatia  and 
Orestes  half  an  hour  after  Philammon  had  taken  possession  of  his 
new  abode. 

Hypatia  looked  at  the  prefect  with  calm  penetration,  not  unmixed 
with  scorn  and  fear. 

“  And  pray  what  has  produced  this  sudden  change  in  your  ex¬ 
cellency’s  earnestness  ?  For  four  months  your  promises  have  been 
lying  fallow.”  She  did  not  confess  how  glad  she  would  have  been 
at  heart  to  see  them  lying  fallow  still. 

“  Because -  This  morning  I  have  news  ;  which  I  tell  to  you  the 

first,  as  a  compliment.  We  will  take  care  that  all  Alexandria  knows 
it  before  sundown.  Heraclian  has  conquered.” 

“  Conquered?”  cried  Hypatia,  springing  from  her  seat. 

“  Conquered,  and  utterly  destroyed  the  emperor’s  forces  at  Ostia. 
So  says  a  messenger  on  whom  I  can  depend.  And  even  if  the 
news  should  prove  false,  I  can  prevent  the  contrary  report  from 
spreading,  or  what  is  the  use  of  being  prefect  ?  You  demur  ?  Ho 
you  not  see  that,  if  we  can  keep  the  notion  alive  but  a  week,  our 
cause  is  won  ?” 

(216) 


t 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER 


217 


How  so?” 

“  I  liave  treated  already  with  all  the  officers  of  the  city,  and  every 
one  of  them  has  acted  like  a  wise  man,  and  given  me  a  promise  of 
help,  conditional,  of  course,  on  Heraclian’s  success,  being  as  tired  as  I 
am  of  that  priest-ridden  court  at  Byzantium.  Moreover,  the  station- 
aries  are  mine  already.  So  are  the  soldiery  all  the  way  up  the  Nile. 

Ah  !  you  have  been  fancying  me  idle  for  these  four  months,  but - 

You  forgot  that  you  yourself  were  the  prize  of  my  toil.  Could  I  be  a 
sluggard  with  that  goal  in  sight  ?  ” 

Hypatia  shuddered,  but  was  silent  ;  and  Orestes  went  on  : — 

“I  have  unladen  several  of  the  wheat-ships  for  enormous  lar¬ 
gesses  of  bread  ;  though  those  rascally  monks  of  Tabenne  had  nearly 
forestalled  my  benevolence,  and  I  was  forced  to  bribe  a  deacon  or 
two,  buy  up  the  stock  they  had  sent  down,  and  retail  it  again  as  my 
own.  It  is  really  most  officious  of  them  to  persist  in  feeding  gratui¬ 
tously  half  the  poor  of  the  city  !  What  possible  business  have  they 
with  Alexandria  ?  ” 

“  The  wish  for  popularity,  I  presume.” 

“  Just  so  ;  and  then  what  hold  can  the  government  have  on  a  set  of 
rogues  whose  stomachs  are  filled  without  our  help  ?  ” 

“Julian  made  the  same  complaint  to  the  high-priest  of  Galatia,  in 
that  priceless  letter  of  his.” 

“Ah,  you  will  set  that  all  right,  you  know,  shortly.  Then,  again, 
I  do  not  fear  Cyril’s  power,  just  now.  He  has  injured  himself  deeply, 
I  am  happy  to  say,  in  the  opinioQ  of  the  wealthy  and  educated,  by 
expelling  the  Jews.  And  as  for  his  mob,  exactly  at  the  right  mo¬ 
ment,  the  deities — there  are  no  monks  here,  so  I  can  attribute  my 
blessings  to  the  right  source — have  sent  us  such  a  boon  as  may  put 
them  into  as  good  a  humor  as  we  need.” 

“  And  what  is  that  ?”  asked  Hypatia. 

“  A  white  elephant.” 

“  A  white  elephant  ?  ” 

“  Yes,”  he  answered,  mistaking  or  ignoring  the  tone  of  her  answer. 
“A  real,  live  white  elephant;  a  thing  which  has  not  been  seen  in 
Alexandria  for  a  hundred  years  !  It  was  passing  through  with  two 
tame  tigers,  as  a  present  to  the  boy  at  Byzantium,  from  some  hun¬ 
dred-wived  kinglet  of  the  Hyperborean  Taprobane,  or  other  no-man’s- 
land  in  the  far  East.  I  took  the  liberty  of  laying  an  embargo  on 
them,  and,  after  a  little  argumentation,  and  a  few  hints  of  torture, 
elephant  and  tigers  are  at  our  service.” 

“  And  of  what  service  are  they  to  be  ?  ” 

“  My  dearest  madam - Conceive . How  are  we  to  win  the  mob 

without  a  show  ?.  .  .  .When  were  there  more  than  two  ways  of  gaining 
either  the  whole  or  part  of  the  Roman  empire, — by  force  of  arms,  or 
force  of  trumpery  ?  Can  even  you  invent  a  third  ?  The  former  is 
unpleasantly  exciting,  and  hardly  practicable  just  now.  The  latter 
rerpains  ;  and,  thanhs  to  the  white  elephant,  may  be  triumphantly 


218 


HYPATIA. 


successful.  I  liave  to  exhibit  something  every  week.  The  people 
are  getting  tired  of  that  pantomime  ;  and  since  the  Jews  were  driven 
out,  the  fellow  has  grown  stupid  and  lazy,  having  lost  the  more 
enthusiastic  half  of  his  spectators.  As  for  horse-racing,  they  are 

sick  of  it . Now,  suppose  we  announce,  for  the  earliest  possible 

day,  a  spectacle, — such  a  spectacle  as  never  was  seen  before  in  this 
generation.  You  and  I — I  as  exhibitor,  you  as  representative — for 

the  time  being  only — of  the  Vestals  of  old — sit  side  %  side . Some 

worthy  friend  has  his  instructions,  when  the  people  are  beside  them¬ 
selves  with  rapture,  to  cry,  ‘Long  live  Orestes  Caesar  !’. . .  .Another 
reminds  them  of  Heraclian’s  victory, — another  couples  your  name 
Math  mine....  the  people  applaud. ..  .some  Mark  Antony  steps  for¬ 
ward,  salutes  me  as  Imperator,  Augustus, — what  you  will, — the  cry 
is  taken  up, — I  refuse  as  meekly  as  Julius  Caesar  himself, — am  com¬ 
pelled,  blushing,  to  accept  the  honor, — I  rise,  make  an  oration  about 
the  future  independence  of  the  southern  continent, — union  of  Africa 
and  Egypt, — the  empire  no  longer  to  be  divided  into  Eastern  and 
Western,  but  Northern  and  Southern.  Shouts  of  applause,  at  two 
drachmas  per  man,  shake  the  skies.  Everybody  believes  that 

everybody  else  approves,  and  follows  the  lead . And  the  thing  is 

won.” 

“  And  pray,”  asked  Hypatia,  crushing  down  her  contempt  and  de¬ 
spair,  “  how  is  this  to  bear  on  the  worship  of  the  gods?” 

“  Why.  .  .  .why.  . .  .if  you  thought  that  people’s  minds  were  suffi¬ 
ciently  prepared,  you  might  rise  in  your  turn,  and  make  an  oration, 
— you  can  conceive  one.  Set  forth  how  these  spectacles,  formerly  the 

glory  of  the  empire,  had  withered  under  Galilean  superstition . 

How  the  only  path  tow^ard  the  full  enjoyment  of  eye  and  ear  was  a 
frank  return  to  those  deities,  from  whose  worship  they  originally 
sprung,  and  connected  with  which  they  could  alone  be  enjoyed  in 

their  perfection . But  I  need  not  teach  you  how  to  do  that  which 

you  have  so  often  taught  me  :  so  now  to  consider  our  spectacle,  which, 
next  to  the  largess,  is  the  most  important  part  of  our  plans.  I  ought 
to  have  exhibited  to  them  the  monk  mJio  so  nearly  killed  me  yester¬ 
day.  That  would  indeed  have  been  a  triumph  of  the  laws  over 
Christianity.  He  and  the  wild  beasts  might  have  given  the  people 
ten  minutes’  amusement.  But  wrath  conquered  prudence  ;  and  the 
fellow  has  been  crucified  these  two  hours.  Suppose,  then,  we  had 
a  little  exhibition  of  gladiators.  They  are  forbidden  by  law,  cer¬ 
tainly.” 

“  Thank  Heaven,  they  are  !” 

“  But  do  you  not  see  that  is  the  very  reason  why  we,  to  assert  our 
own  independence,  should  employ  them  ?  ” 

“No!  they  are  gone.  Let  them  never  re-appear  to  disgrace  the 
earth.” 

“  My  dear  lady,  you  must  not,  in  your  present  character,  say  that 
in  public  ;  lest  Cyril  should  be  impertinent  enough  to  remind  you 
that  Christian  emperors  and  bishops  put  them  down,” 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 


'  219 


Hypatia  bit  her  lip,  and  was  silent. 

“  Well,  I  do  not  wisli  to  urge  anything  unpleasant  to  you . If 

we  could  but  contrive  a  few  martyrdoms, — but  I  really  fear  we  must 
wait  a  year  or  two  longer,  in  the  present  state  of  public  opinion,  be¬ 
fore  we  can  attempt  that.” 

“  Wait  ?  wait  forever  !  Did  not  Julian — and  he  must  be  our 
model — forbid  the  persecution  of  the  Galileans,  considering  them 
sufficiently  punished  by  their  own  atheism  and  self-tormenting  super¬ 
stition  ?  ” 

“  Another  small  error  of  that  great  man.  He  should  have  recol¬ 
lected  that,  for  three  hundred  years,  nothing,  not  even  the  gladiators 
themselves,  had  been  found  to  put  the  mob  in  such  good-humor  as  to 
see  a  few  Christians,  especially  young  and  handsome  women,  burned 
alive,  or  thrown  to  the  lions.” 

Hypatia  bit  her  lip  once  more.  “  I  can  hear  no  more  of  this,  sir. 
You  forget  that  you  are  speaking  to  a  woman.” 

“Most  supreme  Avisdom,”  answered  Orestes,  in  his  blandest  tone, 
“  you  cannot  suppose  that  I  wish  to  pain  your  ears.  But  allow  me  to 
observe,  as  a  general  theorem,  that,  if  one  wishes  to  effect  any  pur¬ 
pose,  it  is  necessary  to  use  the  means  ;  and  on  the  whole,  those  which 
have  been  tested  by  four  hundred  years’  experience  will  be  the  safest. 
I  speak  as  a  plain,  practical  statesman, — but  surely  your  philosophy 
will  not  dissent  ?  ” 

Hypatia  looked  down  in  painful  thought.  What  could  she  an¬ 
swer?  Was  it  not  too  true?  and  had  not  Orestes  fact  and  experience 
on  his  side  ? 

“  Well,  if  you  must — but  I  cannot  have  gladiators.  Why  not  a 
— one  of  those  battles  with  wild  beasts?  They  are  disgusting 
enough :  but  still  they  are  less  inhuman  than  the  others  ;  and  you 
might  surely  take  precautions  to  prevent  the  men  being  hurt.” 

“  Ah  !  that  would  indeed  be  a  scentless  rose  !  If  there  is  neither 
danger  nor  bloodshed,  the  charm  is  gone.  But  really  wild  beasts  are 
too  expensive  just  now:  and  if  I  kill  down  my  present  menagerie,  I 
can  afford  no  more.  Why  not  have  something  which  costs  no  money, 
like  prisoners?  ” 

“  What  !  do  you  rank  human  beings  below  brutes?” 

“  Heaven  forbid  !  But  they  are  practically  less  expensive.  Re¬ 
member  that,  without  money,  we  are  powerless  ;  we  must  husband 
our  resources  for  the  cause  of  the  gods.” 

Hypatia  was  silent. 

“Now,  there  are  fifty  or  sixty  Libyan  prisoners  just  brought  in  from 
the  desert.  Why  not  let  them  fight  an  equal  number  of  soldiers  ? 
They  are  rebels  to  the  empire,  taken  in  war,” 

“  Ah,  then,”  said  Hypatia,  catching  at  any  thread  of  self-jus- 
tification,  “their  lives  are  forfeit  in  any  case,” 

“Of  course.  So  the  Christians  could  not  complain  of  us  for  that. 
Did  not  the  most  Christian  Emperor  Constantine  set  some  three 


220 


HYPATIA. 


liundred  German  prisoners  to  butcher  each  other  in  the  amphitheater 
of  Treves  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  But  they  refused,  and  died  like  heroes,  each  falling  on  his  own 
sword.” 

“  Ah, — those  Germans  are  always  unmanageable.  My  guards, 
now,  are  just  as  stiff-necked.  To  tell  you  the  truth,  I  have  asked 
them  already  to  exhibit  their  prowess  on  these  Libyans,  and  what  do 
you  suppose  they  answered  ?  ” 

“  They  refused,  I  hope.” 

“  They  told  me,  in  the  most  insolent  tone,  that  they  were  men,  and 
not  stage-players  ;  and  hired  to  fight,  and  not  to  butcher.  I  expected 
a  Socratic  dialogue  after  such  a  display  of  dialectic,  and  bowed  myself 
out.” 

“  They  were  right.” 

“  Not  a  doubt  of  it,  from  a  philosophic  point  of  view  ;  from  a 
practical  one  they  were  great  pedants,  and  I  an  ill-used  master. 
However,  I  can  find  unfortunate  and  misunderstood  heroes  enough  in 
the  prisons,  who,  for  the  chance  of  their  liberty,  will  acquit  them¬ 
selves  valiantly  enough ;  and  I  know  of  a  few  old  gladiators  still 
lingering  about  the  wine-shops,  who  will  be  proud  enough  to  give 
them  a  week’s  training.  So  that  may  pass.  Now  for  some  lighter 
species  of  representation  to  follow, — something  more  or  less  dramatic.” 

“  You  forget  that  you  speak  to  one  who  trusts  to  be,  as  soon  as  she 
has  the  power,  the  high-priestess  of  Athene,  and  who  in  the  mean¬ 
while  is  bound  to  obey  her  tutor  Julian’s  commands  to  the  priests  of 
liis  day,  and  imitate  the  Galileans  as  much  in  their  abhorrence  for 
the  theater  as  she  hopes  hereafter  to  do  in  their  care  for  the  widow 
and  the  stranger.” 

“  Far  be  it  from  me  to  impugn  that  great  man’s  wisdom.  But 
allow  me  to  remark,  that,  to  judge  by  the  present  state  of  the  empire, 
one  has  a  right  to  say  that  he  failed.” 

“  The  Sun-God,  whom  he  loved,  took  him  to  himself,  too  early,  by 
a  hero’s  death.” 

“  And  the  moment  he  was  removed,  the  wave  of  Christian  bar¬ 
barism  rolled  back  again  into  its  old  channel.” 

“  Ah  !  had  he  but  lived  twenty  years  longer  !  ” 

“The  Sun-God,  perhaps,  was  not  so  solicitous  as  we  are  for  11h‘ 
success  of  his  high-priest’s  projects.” 

Hypatia  reddened, — was  Orestes,  after  all,  laughing  in  his  sleeve 
at  her  and  her  hopes  ? 

“  Do  not  blaspheme  !”  she  said,  solemnly. 

“  Heaven  forbid  !  I  only  offer  one  possible  explanation  of  a  plain 
fact.  The  other  is,  that,  as  Julian  was  not  going  quite  the  right  way 
to  work  to  restore  the  worship  of  the  Olympians,  the  Sun-God  found 
it  expedient  to  withdraw  him  from  his  post,  and  now  send§  in  his 
place  Hypatia  the  philosopher,  who  will  be  wise  enough  to  avoid 
Julian’s  error,  and  not  copy  the  Galileans  too  closely,  by  imitating  a 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  221 

severity  of  morals  at  wliich  they  are  the  only  true  and  natural 
adepts.” 

“  So  Julian’s  error  was  that  of  being  too  virtuous  ?  If  it  be  so,  let 
me  copy  him,  and  fail  like  him.  The  fault  will  then  not  be  mine, 
but  fate’s.” 

“Not  in  being  too  virtuous  himself,  most  stainless  likeness  of 
Athene,  but  in  trying  to  make  others  so.  He  forgot  one-half  of  Juve¬ 
nal’s  great  dictum  about  ‘  Panem  and  Circenses,’  as  the  absolute  and 
overruling  necessities  of  rulers.  He  tried  to  give  the  people  the 

bread  without  the  games . And  what  thanks  he  received  for  his 

enormous  munificence,  let  himself  and  the.  good  folks  of  Antioch 
tell, — you  just  quoted  his  Misopogon - ” 

“  Ay, — the  lament  of  a  man  too  pure  for  his  age.” 

“Exactly  so.  He  should  rather  have  been  content  keep  his 
purity  to  himself,  and  have  gone  to  Antioch  not  merely  as  a  philo¬ 
sophic  high-priest,  with  a  beard  of  questionable  cleanliness,  to  offer 
sacrifices  to  a  god  in  whom — forgive  me — nobody  in  Antioch  had  be¬ 
lieved  for  many  a  year.  If  he  had  made  his  entrance  with  ten  thou¬ 
sand  gladiators,  and  our  white  elephant,  built  a  theater  of  ivory  and 
glass  in  Haphnse,  and  proclaimed  games  in  honor  of  the  Sun,  or  of 
any  other  member  of  the  Pantheon - ” 

“  He  would  have  acted  unworthily  of  a  philosopher.” 

“But  instead  of  that  one  priest  draggling  up,  poor  devil,  through 
the  wet  grass  to  the  deserted  altar,  with  his  solitary  goose  under  his 
arm,  he  would  have  had  every  goose  in  Antioch — forgive  my  stealing 
a  pun  from  Aristophanes — running  open-mouthed  to  worship  any 
god,  known  or  unknown, — and  to  see  the  sights.” 

“  Well,”  said  Hypatia,  yielding  perforce  to  Orestes’s  cutting  argu 
ments.  “Let  us  then  restore  the  ancient  glories  of  the  Greek 
drama.  Let  us  give  them  a  trilogy  of  H3schylus  or  Sophocles.” 

“  Too  calm,  my  dear  madam.  The  Eumenides  might  do  certainly, 
or  Philoctetes,  if  we  could  but  put  Philoctetes  to  real  pain,  and  make 
the  spectators  sure  that  he  was  yelling  in  good  earnest.” 

“  Disgusting !  ” 

“  But  necessary,  like  many  disgusting  things.” 

“  Why  not  try  the  Prometheus  ?  ” 

“A  magnificent  field  for  stage  effect,  certainly.  What  with  those 

ocean  nymphs  in  their  winged  chariot,  and  Ocekn  on  his  griffin . 

But  I  should  hardly  think  it  safe  to  re-introduce  Zeus  and  Hermes  to 
the  people  under  the  somewhat  ugly  light  in  which  iEschylus  ex¬ 
hibits  them.” 

“  I  forgot  that,”  said  Hypatia.  “The  Orestean  trilogy  will  be 
best,  after  all.” 

“Best?  perfect, — divine  I  Ah,  that  it  were  to  be  my  fate  to  go 
down  to  posterity  as  the  happy  man  who  once  more  revived  ^schy- 
lus’s  masterpieces  on  a  Grecian  stage  !  But -  Is  there  not,  beg¬ 

ging  the  pardon  of  the  great  tragedian,  too  much  reserve  in  the 


222 


HYPATIA. 


Agamemnon  for  onr  modern  taste  ?  If  we  could  have  the  bath  scene 
represented  on  the  stage,  and  an  Agamemnon  who  could  be  really 
killed — though  I  would  not  insist  on  that,  because  a  good  actor  might 
make  it  a  reason  for  refusing  the  part — but  still  the  murder  ought  to 
take  place  in  public.” 

‘  ‘  Shocking  !  an  outrage  on  all  the  laws  of  the  drama.  Does  not 
even  the  Roman  Horace  lay  down  as  a  rule  the — Nec  pueros  coram 
populo  Medea  trucidet  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  Fairest  and  wisest,  I  am  as  willing  a  pupil  of  the  dear  old  Epi¬ 
curean  as  any  man  living, — even  to  the  furnishing  of  my  chamber  ; 
of  which  fact  the  Empress  of  Africa  may  some  day  assure  herself. 
But  we  are  not  now  discussing  the  art  of  poetry,  but  the  art  of  reign¬ 
ing  ;  and,  after  all,  while  Horace  was  sitting  in  his  easy-chair,  giving 
his  countrymen  good  advice,  a  private  man,  who  knew  somewhat 
better  than  he  what  the  mass  admired,  was  exhibiting  forty  thousand 
gladiators  at  his  mother’s  funeral.” 

“  But  the  canon  has  its  foundation  in  the  eternal  laws  of  beauty. 
It  has  been  accepted  and  observed.” 

“  Not  by  the  people  for  whom  it  was  written.  The  learned  Hypa¬ 
tia  has  surely  not  forgotten,  that  within  sixty  years  after  the  Ars 
Poetica  was  written,  Annaeus  Seneca,  or  whosoever  wrote  that  very 
bad  tragedy  called  the  Medea,  found  it  so  necessary  that  she  should, 
in  despite  of  Horace,  kill  her  children  before  the  people,  that  he 
actually  made  her  do  it  !  ” 

Hypatia  was  still  silent, — foiled  at  every  point,  while  Orestes  ran 
on  with  provoking  glibness. 

“And  consider,  too,  even  if  we  dare  alter  .^schylus  a  little,  we 
could  find  no  one  to  act  him.” 

“Ah,  true  !  fallen,  fallen  days  !  ” 

“And  really,  after  all,  omitting  the  questionable  complirnent  to 
me,  as  candidate  for  a  certain  dignity,  of  having  my  namesake  kill 
,his  mother,  and  then  be  hunted  over  the  stage  by  furies - ” 

‘  ‘  But  Apollo  vindicates  and  purifies  him  at  last.  What  a  nqble 
occasion  that  last  scene  would  give  for  winning  them  back  to  their 
old  reverence  for  the  god  !  ” 

“  True,  but  at  present  the  majority  of  spectators  will  believe  more 
strongly  in  the  horrors  of  matricide  and  furies  than  in  Apollo’s  power 
to  dispense  therewith.  So  that,  I  fear,  must  be  one  of  your  labors  of 
the  future.” 

“And  it  shall  be,”  said  Hypatia.  But  she  did  not  speak  cheer¬ 
fully. 

“  Do  you  not  think,  moreover,”  went  on  the  tempter,  “  that  those 
old  tragedies  might  give  somewhat  too  gloomy  a  notion  of  those  deities 
whom  we  wish  to  re-introduce, — I  beg  pardon,  to  re-honor?  The  his 
tory  of  the  house  of  Atreus  is  hardly  more  cheerful,  in  spite  of  its 
beauty,  than  one  of  Cyril’s  sermons  on  the  day  qf  judgment,  and  the 
Tartarus  prepared  for  hapless  rich  people,’^ 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER, 


223 


“  Well/’  said  Hypatia,  more  and  more  listlessly  :  it  might  be 
more  prudent  to  show  them  first  the  fairer  and  more  graceful  side  of 
the  old  Myths.  Certmnly  the  great  age  of  Athenian  tragedy  had  its 
playful  reverse  in  the  old  comedy.’’ 

“  And  in  certain  Hionysiac  sports  and  processions  which  shall  he 
nameless,  in  order  to  awaken  a  proper  devotion  to  the  gods  in  those 
who  might  not  be  able  to  appreciate  ^schylus  and  Sophocles.” 

“  You  would  not  re-introduce  them  !” 

“  Pallas  forbid  !  but  give  as  fair  a  substitute  for  them  as  we  can.” 

“  And  are  we  to  degrade  ourselves  because  the  masses  are  de¬ 
graded  ?  ” 

“  Not  in  the  least.  For  my  own  part,  this  whole  business,  like  the 
catering  for  the  weekly  pantomimes,  is  as  great  a  bore  to  me  as  it 
could  have  been  to  Julian  himself.  But,  my  dearest  madam, — ‘Panem 
and  Circenses,’ — they  must  be  put  into  good-humor  ;  and  there  is  but 
one  way, —  by  ‘  the  lust  of  the  flesh,  and  the  lust  of  the  eye,  and  the 
pride  of  life,’  as  a  certain  Galilean  correctly  defines  the  time-honored 
Roman  method.” 

“  Put  them  into  good-humor  ?  I  wish  to  lustrate  them  afresh  for 
the  service  of  the  gods.  If  we  must  have  comic  representations,  we 
can  only  have  them  conjoined  to  tragedy,  which,  as  Aristotle  defines 
it,  will  purify  their  affections  by  pity  and  terror.” 

Orestes  smiled. 

“  I  certainly  can  have  no  objection  to  so  good  a  purpose.  But  do 
you  not  think  that  the  battle  between  the  gladiators  and  the  Libyans 
will  have  done  that  sufficiently  beforehand  ?  I  can  conceive  nothing 
more  fit  for  that  end,  unless  it  be  Nero’s  method  of  sending  his  guards 
among  the  spectators  themselves,  and  throwing  them  down  to  the 
wild  beasts  of  the  arena.  How  thoroughly  purified  by  pity  and  ter¬ 
ror  must  every  worthy  shopkeeper  have  been,  when  he  sat  uncertain 
whether  he  might  not  follow  his  fat  wife  into  the  claws  of  the  nearest 
lion  !  ” 

“  You  are  pleased  to  be  witty,  sir,”  said  Hypatia,  hardly  able  to 
conceal  her  disgust. 

“  My  dearest  bride  elect,  I  only  meant  the  most  harmless  of  reduc- 
tiones  ad  absurdum  of  an  abstract  canon  of  Aristotle,  with  which  I, 
who  am  a  Platoiiist  after  my  mistress’s  model ,  do  not  happen  to  agree. 
But  do,  I  beseech  you,  be  ruled,  not  by  me,  but  by  your  own  wisdom. 
Fou  cannot  bring  the  people  to  appreciate  your  designs  at  the  first 
sight.  You  are  too  wise,  too  pure,  too  lofty,  too  far-sighted  for  them. 
And  therefore  you  must  get  power  to  compel  them.  Julian,  after  all, 
found  it  necessary  to  compel, — if  he  had  lived  seven  years  more,  he 
would  have  found  it  necessary  to  persecute.” 

“  The  gods  forbid  that — that  such  a  necessity  should  ever  arise  ’ 
here.  ” 

“  The  only  way  to  avoid  it,  believe  me,  is  to  allure  and  to  indulge. 
After  all,  it  is  for  their  good.  ” 


224 


HYPATIA, 


*\True  sighed  Hypatia.  Have  your  way,  sir.” 

“  Believe  me,  you  shall  have  jmurs  in  turn.  I  ask  you  to  be  ruled 
by  me  now,  only  that  you  may  be  in  a  position  to  rule  me  and  Africa 
hereafter.” 

“  And  such  an  Africa  !  Well,  if  they  are  born  low  and  earthly, 
they  must,  I  suppose,  be  treated  as  such  ;  and  the  fault  of  such  a 
necessity  is  Nature’s,  and  not  ours.  Yet  it  is  most  degrading  !  But, 
still,  if  the  only  method  by  which  the  philosophic  few  can  assume 
their  rights,  as  the  divinely  appointed  rulers  of  the  world,  is  by  in¬ 
dulging  those  lower  beings  whom  they  govern  for  their  good, — why 
be  it  so.  It  is  no  worse  necessity  than  many  another  which  the  ser¬ 
vant  of  the  gods  must  endure  in  days  like  these.” 

“Ah,”  said  Orestes,  refusing  to  hear  the  sigh,  or  to  see  the  bitter¬ 
ness  of  the  lip,  which  accompanied  the  speech, — “  now  Hypatia  is 
herself  again  ;  and  my  counselor,  and  giver  of  deep  and  celestial 
reasons  for  all  things  at  which  poor  I  can  only  snatch  and  guess  by 
vulpine  cunning.  So  now  for  our  lighter  entertainment.  What 
shall  it  be  ?  ” 

“What  you  will,  provided  it  be  not,  as  most  such  are,  unfit 
for  the  eyes  of  modest  women.  I  have  no  skill  in  catering  for 
folly.” 

“A  pantomime,  then?  We  may  make  that  as  grand  and  as  signifi¬ 
cant  as  we  will,  and  expend  too  on  it  all  our  treasures  in  the  way  of 
gewgaws  and  wild  beasts.” 

“  As  you  like.” 

“Just  consider,  too,  what  a  scope  for  mythologic  learning  a  pan¬ 
tomime  affords.  Why  not  have  a  triumph  of  some  deity  ?  Could  I 
commit  myself  more  boldly  to  the  service  of  the  gods.  Now,  who 
shall  it  be  ?  ” 

“  Pallas, — unless,  as  I  suppose,  she  is  too  modest  and  too  sober  for 
your  Alexandrians?” 

“  Yes, — it  does  not  seem  to  me  that  she  would  ^be  appreciated, — at 
all  events  for  the  present.  Why  not  try  Aphrodite  ?  Christians  as 
well  as  Pagans  will  thoroughly  understand  her,  and  I  know  no  one 
who  will  not  degrade  the  virgin  goddess  by  representing  her,  except 
a  certain  lady,  who  has  already,  1  hope,  consented  to  sit  in  that  very 
character,  by  the  side  of  her  too-much-honored  slave  ;  and  one  Pallas 
is  enough  at  a  time  in  any  theater.” 

Hypatia  shuddered.  He  took  it  all  for  granted,  then,  and  claimed 
her  conditional  promise  to  the  uttermost.  Was  there  no  escape  ? 
She  longed  to  spring  up  and  rush  away,  into  the  streets,  into  the 
desert, — anything  to  break  the  hideous  net  which  she  had  wound 
round  herself.  And  yet — was  it  not  the  cause  of  the  gods, — the  one 
object  of  her  life?  And  after  all,  if  he  the  hateful  was  to  be  her 
emperor,  she  at  least  was  to  be  an  empress  ;  and  do  what  she  would, 
— and  half  in  irony,  and  half  in  the  attempt  to  hurl  herself  perforce 
into  that  which  she  knew  that  she  must  go  through,  and  forget 
misery  in  activity,  she  answered  as  cheerfully  as  she  could. 


MM  STOOPS  TO  GONQtTMR.  ,  225 

Then,  my  goddess,  tliou  must  wait  tlie  pleasure  of  these  base 
ones  !  At  least  the  young  Apollo  will  have  charms  even  for  them.” 

“Ay,  hut  who  will  represent  him?  This  puny  generation  does 

not  produce  such  figures  as  Pylades  and  Bathyllus, - except  among 

those  Goths.  Besid^es,  Apollo  must  have  golden  hair  ;  and  our  Greek 
race  has  intermingled  itself  so  shamefully  with  these  Egytians,  that 
our  stage-troop  is  as  dark  as  Andromeda,  and  we  should  have  to 
apply  again  to  those  accursed  Goths,  who  have  nearly”  (with  a  how) 
“  all  the  beauty,  and  nearly  all  the  money  and  the  power,  and  will, 
I  suspect,  have  the  rest  of  it  before  I  am  safe  out  of  this  wicked 
world,  because  they  have,  not  nearly,  but  quite,  all  the  courage. 
Now — Shall  we  ask  a  Goth  to  dance  Apollo?  for  we  can  get  no  one 
else.” 

Hypatia. smiled  in  spite  of  herself  at  the  notion.  “That  would  be 
too  shameful  !  I  must  forego  the  god  of  light  himself,  if  I  am  to  see 
him  in  the  person  of  a  clumsy  barbarian.” 

“  Then  why  not  try  my  despised  and  rejected  Aphrodite  !  Suppose 
we  had  her  triumph,  finishing  with  a  dance  of  Venus  Anadyomene. 
Surely  that  is  a  graceful  myth  enough.” 

“  As  a  myth  ;  but  on  the  stage,  in  reality?  ” 

“  Not  worse  than  what  this  Christian  city  has  been  looking  at  for 
many  a  year.  We  shall  not  run  any  danger  of  corrupting  moralit''’’ 
be  sure.” 

Hypatia  blushed. 

“  Then  you  must  not  ask  for  my  help.” 

“  Or  for  your  presence  at  the  spectacle?  For  that  be  sure  is  a 
necessary  point.  You  are  too  great  a  person,  my  dearest  madam,  in 
the  eyes  of  these  good  folks,  to  be  allowed  to  absent  yourself  on  such 
an  occasion.  If  my  little  stratagem  succeeds,  it  will  be  half  owing 
to  the  fact  of  the  people  knowing  that,  in  crowning  me,  they  crown 

Hypatia . Come  now, — do  you  not  see  that,  as  you  must  needs  be 

present  at  their  harmless  scrap  of  mythology,  taken  from  the  authen¬ 
tic  and  undoubted  histories  of  those  very  gods  whose  worship  wo 
intend  to  restore,  you  will  consult  your  own  comfort  most  in  agreeing 
to  it  cheerfully,  and  in  lending  me  your  wisdom  toward  arranging 
it?  Just  conceive,  now,  a  triumph  of  Aphrodite,  entering  preceded 
by  wild  beasts  led  in  chains  by  Cupids,  the  white  elephant  and  all, — 
what  a  field  for  the  plastic  art  !  You  might  have  a  thousand  group¬ 
ings,  dispersions,  regroupings,  in  as  perfect  bas-relief  style  as  those 
of  any  Sophoclean  drama.  Allow  me  only  to  take  this  paper  and 


And  he  began  sketching  rapidly  group  after  group. 

Not  so  ugly,  surely  ?  ” 

“  They  are  very  lovely,  I  cannot  deny,”  said  poor  Hypatia. 

“  Ah,  sweetest  empress  !  you  forget  sometimes  that  I,  too,  world- 
worn  as  I  am,  am  a  Greek,  with  as  intense  a  love  of  the  beautiful  as 
even  you  yourself  have.  Do  not  fancy  that  every  violation  of  correct 
HYPATIA — 8 


/ 


^26  HYPATIA. 

taste  does  not  torture  me  as  keenly  as  it  does  you.  Some  day,  I  liopO, 
you  will  have  learned  to  pity  and  to  excuse  the  wretched  compromise 
between  that  which  ought  to  be  and  that  which  can  be,  in  which  we 
hapless  statesmen  must  struggle  on,  half -stunted,  and  wholly  mis¬ 
understood, — Ah,  well  !  Look,  now,  at  these  fauns  and  dryads 
among  the  shrubs  upon  the  stage,  pausing  in  startled  wonder  at  the 
first  blast  of  music  which  proclaims  the  exit  of  the  goddess  from  her 
temple.” 

“  The  temple  ?  Why,  where  are  you  going  to  exhibit  ?  ” 

“  In  the  Theater,  of  course.  Where  else  pantomimes  ?” 

“  But  will  the  spectators  have  time  to  move  all  the  way  from  the 
Amphitheater  after  that — those - ” 

“  The  Amphitheater  ?  We  shall  exhibit  the  Libyans  too,  in  the 
Theater,” 

‘  ‘  Combats  in  the  Theater  sacred  to  Bionusos  ?  ” 

“My  dear  lady,” — penitently, — “  I  know  it  is  an  offense  against  all 
the  laws  of  the  drama.” 

“  0,  worse  than  that  !  Consider  what  an  impiety  toward  the  god, 
to  desecrate  his  altar  with  bloodshed  1  ” 

“  Fairest  devotee,  recollect  that,  after  all,  I  may  fairly  borrow 
Dionusos’s  altar  in  this  my  extreme  need  ;  for  I  saved  its  very  exist¬ 
ence  for  him,  by  preventing  the  magistrates  from  filling  up  the 
whole  orchestra  with  benches  for  the  patricians,  after  the  barbarous 
Roman  fashion.  And  besides,  what  possible  sort  of  representation, 
or  misrepresentation,  has  not  been  exhibited  in  every  theater  of  the 
empire  for  the  last  four  hundred  years?  Have  we  not  had  tumblers, 
conjurers,  allegories,  matyrdoms,  marriages,  elephants  on  the  tight 
rope,  learned  horses,  and  learned  asses  too,  if  we  may  trust  Apuleius 
of  Madaura  ;  with  a  good  many  other  spectacles  of  which  we  must 
not  speak  in  the  presence  of  a  vestal  ?  It  is  an  age  of  execrable  taste, 
and  we  must  act  accordingly,” 

“Ah!”  answered  Hypatia;  “the  first  step  in  the  downward 
career  of  the  drama  began  when  the  successors  of  Alexander  dared 
to  profane  theaters  which  had  re-echoed  the  choruses  of  Sophocles 
and  Euripides  by  degrading  the  altar  of  Dionusos  into  a  stage  for 
pantomimes  I  ” 

“  "'Vliicli  your  pure  mind  must,  doubtless,  consider  not  so  very 
much  better  than  a  little  fighting.  But,  after  all,  the  Ptolemies 
could  not  do  otherwise.  You  can  only  have  Sophoclean  dramas  in  a 
Sophoclean  age  ;  and  theirs  was  no  more  of  one  than  ours  is,  and  so 
the  drama  died  a  natural  death  ;  and  when  that  happens  to  man  or 
thing,  you  may  weep  over  it  if  you  will,  but  you  must,  after  all,  bury 
it,  and  get  something  else  in  its  place, — except,  of  course,  the  wor 
ship  of  the  gods.” 

“  lam  glad  that  you  except  that,  at  least,”  said  Hypatia,  some 
what  bitterly.  “  But  why  not  use  the  Amphitheater  for  both  spec 
tacles  ?  ” 


STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Wliat  can  I  do  ?  I  am  over  head  and  ears  in  debt  already  ;  and 
the  Amphitheater  is  half  in  ruins,  thanks  to  that  fanatic  edict  of  the 
late  emperor’s  against  gladiators.  There  is  no  time  or  money  for  re¬ 
pairing  it  ;  and  besides,  how  pitiful  a  poor  hundred  of  combatants 
will  look  in  an  arena  built  to  hold  two  thousand.  Consider,  my 
dearest  lady,,  in  what  fallen  times  we  live  !  ” 

“I  do,  indeed!”  said  Hypatia.  “But  I  will  not  see  the  altar 
polluted  by  blood.  It  is  the  desecration  which  it  has  undergone  al¬ 
ready  which  has  provoked  the  god  to  withdraw  the  poetic  inspira¬ 
tion.” 

“  I  do  not  doubt  the  fact.  Some  curse  from  Heaven,  certainly  has 
fallen  on  our  poets,  to  judge  by  their  exceeding  badness.  Indeed,  I 
am  inclined  to  attribute  the  insane  vagaries  of  the  water-drinking 
monks  and  nuns,  like  those  of  the  Argive  women,  to  the  same  celes¬ 
tial  anger.  But  I  will  see  that  the  sanctity  of  the  altar  is  pre¬ 
served,  by  confining  the  combat  to  the  stage.  And  as  for  the  panto¬ 
mime  which  will  follow,  if  you  would  only  fall  in  with  my  fancy  of 
the  triumph  of  Aphrodite,  Dionusos  would  hardly  refuse  his  altar 
for  the  glorification  of  his  own  lady-love.” 

“  Ah, — that  myth  is  a  late,  and  in  my  opinion  a  degraded  one.” 

“Be  it  so;  but  recollect,  that  another  myth  makes  her,  and  not 
without  reason,  the  mother  of  all  living  beings.  Be  sure  that  Hio- 
nusos  will  have  no  objection,  or  any  other  god  either,  to  allow  her 
to  make  her  children  feel  her  conquering  might  ;  for  they  all  know 
well  enough,  that,  if  we  can  once  get  her  well  worshiped  here, 
all  Olympus  will  follow  in  her  train. 

“  That  was  spoken  of  the  celestial  Aphrodite,  whose  symbol  is 
the  tortoise,  the  emblem  of  domestic  modesty  and  chastity  ;  not  of 
that  baser  Pandemic  one.” 

“  Then  we  will  take  care  to  make  the  people  aware  of  whom  they 
are  admiring  by  exhibiting  in  the  triumph  whole  legions  of  tor¬ 
toises  ;  and  you  yourself  shall  write  the  chant,  while  I  will  see  that 
the  chorus  is  worthy  of  what  it  has  to  sing.  No  mere  squeak¬ 
ing  double  flute  and  a  pair  of  boys  ;  but  a  whole  army  of  Cyclops 
and  Graces,  with  such  trebles,  and  such  bass  voices  I  It  shall  make 
Cyril’s  ears  tingle  in  his  palace  !  ” 

“  The  chant?  A  noble  office  for  me  truly  !  That  is  the  very  part 
of  the  absurd  spectacle  to  which  you  used  to  say  the  people  never 
dreamed  of  attending.  All  which  is  worth  settling,  you  seem  to 
have  settled  for  yourself  before  you  deigned  to  consult  me.” 

“I  said  so?  Surely  you  must  mistake.  But  if  any  hired  poetas¬ 
ter’s  chant  do  pass  unheeded,  what  has  that  to  do  with  Hypatia’s 
eloquence  and  science,  glowing  with  the  treble  inspiration  of  Athene, 
Phoebus,  and  Dionusos  ?  And  as  for  having  arranged  beforehand, — 
my  adorable  mistress,  what  more  delicate  compliment  could  I 
have  paid  you  ?  ” 

“  I  cannot  say  that  it  seems  to  me  to  be  one.” 


EyPATiA.  . 

“How?  After  savins:  you  every  trouble  wliicli  I  could,  and  rack¬ 
ing  my  overburdened  wits  for  stage  effects  and  properties,  have  I 
not  brought  hither  the  darling  children  of  my  own  brain,  and  laid 
them  down  ruthlessly,  for  life  or  'death,  before  the  judgment-seat  of 
your  lofty  and  unsparing  criticism  ?  ” 

Hypatia  felt  herself  tricked  ;  but  there  was  no  escape  now. 

“And  who,  pray,  is  to  disgrace  herself,  and  me,  as  Yenus 
Anadyomene  ?  ’’ 

“  Ah  !  that  is  the  most  exquisite  article  in  all  my  bill  of  fare  !  What 
if  the  kind  gods  have  enabled  me  to  exact  a  promise  from — whom, 
think  you  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  What  care  I  ?  How  can  I  tell  ?  ”  asked  Hypatia,  who  suspected 
and  dreaded  that  she  could  tell. 

“  Pelagia  herself  !  ” 

Hypatia  rose  angrily. 

“  This,  sir,  at  least,  is  too  much  !  It  was  not  enough  for  you,  it 
seems,  to  claim,  or  rather  to  take  for  granted,  so  imperiously,  so 
mercilessly,  a  conditional  promise, — weakly,  weakly  made,  in  the 
vain  hope  that  you  would  help  forward  aspirations  of  mine  which 
you  have  let  lie  fallow  for  months, — in  which  I  do  not  believe  that 
you  sympathize  now  ! — It  was  not  enough  for  you  to  declare  yourself 
publicly  yesterday  a  Christian,  and  to  come  hither  this  morning  to 
flatter  me  into  the  belief  that  you  will  dare,  ten  days  hence,  to  restore 
the  worship  of  the  .gods  whom  you  have  abjured  ! — It  was  not  enough 
to  plan  without  me  all  those  movements  in  which  you  told  me  I  was 
to  be  your  fellow-counselor, — the  very  condition  which  you  yourself 
offered  ! — It  was  not  enough  for  you  to  command  me  to  sit  in  that 
theater,  as  your  bait,  your  puppet,  your  victim,  blushing  and  shud¬ 
dering  at  sights  unfit  for  the  eyes  of  gods  and  men  : — but,  over  and 
above  all  this,  I  must  assist  in  the  renewed  triumph  of  a  woman  who 
has  laughed  down  my  teaching,  seduced  away  my  scholars,  braved 
me  in  my  very  lecture-room, — who  for  four  years  has  done  more  than 
even  Cyril  himself  to  destroy  all  the  virtue  and  truth  which  I  have 
toiled  to  sow, — and  toiled  in  vain  !  O  beloved  gods  !  Where  will  end 
the  tortures  through  which  your  martyr  must  witness  for  you  to  a 
fallen  race  ? 

And,  in  spite  of  all  her  pride,  and  of  Orestes’s  presence,  her  eyes 
filled  with  scalding  tears. 

Orestes’s  eyes  had  sunk  before  the  vehemence  of  her  just  passion  : 
but,  as  she  added  the  last  sentence  in  a  softer  and  sadder  tone,  he 
raised  them  again,  with  a  look  of  sorrow  and  entreaty,  as  his  heart 
whispered, — 

“  Fool ! — fanatic  ?  But  she  is  too  beautiful  ?  Win  her  I  must  and 
will !  ” 

“  Ah  !  dearest,  noblest  Hypatia  !  what  have  I  done  ?  Unthinking 
fool  that  I  was  !  In  the  wish  to  save  you  trouble, — in  the  hope  that 
I  could  show  you,  by  the  aptness  of  my  own  plans,  that  my  practical 


2^9 


Me  stoops  to  CONQtfER. 

statesmanship  was  not  altogether  an  unworthy  helpmate  for  your 
loftier  wisdom, — wretch  that  I  am,  I  have  otfended  you  ;  and  I  have 
ruined  the  cause  of  those  very  gods  for  whom  I  swear,  I  am  as  ready 
to  sacrifice  myself  as  ever  you  can  he  !  ” 

The  last  sentence  had  the  effect  which  it  was  meant  to  have. 

“  Ruined  the  cause  of  the  gods?”  asked  she  in  a  startled  tone. 

“  Is  it  not  ruined,  without  your  help  ?  And  what  am  I  to  under¬ 
stand  from  your  words  but  that — hapless  man  that  I  am  ! — you  leave 
me  and  them  henceforth  to  our  own  unassisted  strength  !  ” 

“  The  unassisted  strength  of  the  gods  is  omnipotence.” 

“Be  it  so.  But — why  is  Cyril,  and  not  Hypatia,  master  of  the 
masses  of  Alexandria  this  day  ?  Why,  but  because  he  and  his  have 
fought,  and  suffered,  and  died  too,  many  a  hundred  of  them,  for 
their  god,  omnipotent  as  they  believe  him  to  be  ?  Why  are  the  old 
gods  forgotten,  my  fairest  logician? — for  forgotten  they  are.” 

Hypatia  trembled  from  head  to  foot,  and  Orestes  went  on  more 
blandly  than  ever. 

“  I  will  not  ask  an  answer  to  that  question  of  mine.  All  I  entreat 
is  forgiveness  for — what  for  I  know'  not  ;  but  I  have  sinned,  and  that 
is  enough  for  me.  What  if  I  have  been  too  confiaent, — too  hasty? 
Are  not  you  the  prize  for  which  I  strain  ?  and  will  not  the  precious¬ 
ness  of  the  victor’s  wreath  excuse  some  impatience  in  his  struggle  for 
it  ?  Hypatia  has  forgotten  Avho  and  what  the  gods  have  made  her, — 
she  has  not  even  consulted  her  own  mirror,  when  she  blames  one  of 
her  innumerable  adorers  for  a  forwardness  which  ought  to  be  rather 
imputed  to  him  as  a  virtue.” 

And  Orestes  stole  meekly  such  a  glance  of  adoration,  that  Hypatia 

blushed,  and  turned  her  face  away . After  all,  she  was  woman . 

And  she  was  a  fanatic . And  she  was  to  be  an  empress . And 

Orestes’s  voice  was  as  melodious,  and  his  manner  as  graceful,  as  ever 
charmed  the  heart  of  woman. 

“  But  Pelagia  ?  ”  she  said,  at  last,  recovering  herself. 

“Would  that  I  had  never  seen  the  creature  !  But,  after  all,  I 
really  fancied  that  in  doing  what  I  have  done  I  should  gratify  you.” 

“Me?” 

“  Surely,  if  revenge  be  sweet,  as  they  say,  it  could  hardly  find  a 
more  delicate  satisfaction  than  in  the  degradation  of  one  who - ” 

“  Revenge,  sir  ?  Do  you  dream  that  I  am  capable  of  so  base  a  pas¬ 
sion  ?  ” 

“I!  Pallas  forbid  !”  said  Orestes,  finding  himself  on  the  wrong 
path  again.  “  But  recollect  that  the  allowing  this  spectacle  to  take 
place  might  rid  you  forever  of  an  unpleasant — I  will  not  say  rival.” 

“  How,  then  ?  ” 

“Will  not  her  reappearance  on  the  stage,  after  all  her  proud  pro 
fessions  of  contempt  for  it,  do  something  toward  reducing  her,  in 
the  eyes  of  -  this  scandalous  little  town,  to  her  true  and  native 
level  ?  She  will  hardly  dare  thenceforth  to  go  about  parading  her- 


JIYPAflA. 


self  as  the  consort  of  a  god-descended  hero,  or  thrusting  herself  un¬ 
hidden  into  Hypatia’s  presence,  as  if  she  were  the  daughter  of  a 
consul.” 

“  But  I  cannot — I  cannot  allow  it  even  to  her.  After  all,  Orestes, 
she  is  a  woman.  And  can  I,  philosopher  as  1  am,  help  to  degrade 
her  even  one  step  lower  than  she  lies  already?” 

Hypatia  had  all  but  said  “a  woman  even  as  I  am  ;”  but  Neo- 
Platonic  philosophy  taught  her  better  ;  and  she  checked  the  hasty 
assertion  of  anything  like  a  common  sex  or  common  humanity  be¬ 
tween  two  beings  so  antipodal, 

“  Ah,”  rejoined  Orestes,  “  that  unlucky  word  degrade  !  Unthink¬ 
ing  that  I  was,  to  use  it,  forgetting  that  she  herself  will  be  no  more 
degraded  in  her  own  eyes,  or  any  one’s  else,  by  hearing  again  the 
plaudits  of  those  ‘dear  Macedonians,’  on  whose  breath  she  has  lived 
for  years,  than  a  peacock  when  he  displays  his  train.  Unbounded 
vanity  and  self-conceit  are  not  unpleasant  passions,  after  all,  for  their 
victim.  After  all,  she  is  what  she  is,  and  her  being  so  is  no  fault  of 
yours.  O,  it  must  be  !  indeed  it  must  !  ” 

Poor  Hypatia !  The  bait  was  too  delicate,  the  tempter  too  wily  ; 
and  yet  she  was  ashamed  to  speak  aloud  the  philosophic  dogma  which 
flashed  a  ray  of  comfort  and  resignation  through  her  mind,  and  re¬ 
minded  her  that  after  all  there  Avas  no  harm  in  allowing  lower  na¬ 
tures  to  develop  themselves  freely  in  that  direction  which  Nature  had 
appointed  for  them,  and  in  which  only  they  could  fulfill  the  laws  of 
their  being,  as  necessary  varieties  in  the  manifold  whole  of  the  uni¬ 
verse.  So  she  cut  the  interview  short  with — 

“If  it  must  be,  then.... I  will  now  retire,  and  write  the  ode. 
Only,  I  refuse  to  have  any  communication  whatsoever  Avith — I  am 
ashamed  of  even  mentioning  her  name.  I  Avill  send  the  ode  to  you, 
and  she  must  adapt  her  dance  to  it  as  best  she  can.  By  her  taste,  or 
fancy  rather,  I  Avill  not  be  ruled.” 

“  And  I,”  said  Orestes,  Avith  a  profusion  of  thanlts,  “  will  retire  to 
rack  my  faculties  over  the  ‘  dispositions.’  On  this  day  Aveek  we  ex- 
liibit — and  conquer  !  FareAvell,  queen  of  wisdom  !  Your  philosophy 
never  shows  to  better  advantage  than  Avdien  you  thus  wisely  and 
gracefully  subordinate  that  Avhich  is  beautiful  in  itself  to  that  which 
is  beautiful  relatively  and  practically.” 

He  departed  ;  and  Hypatia,  half  dreading  her  own  thoughts,  sat 
down  at  once  to  labor  at  the  ode.  Certainly  it  was  a  magnificent  sub¬ 
ject.  What  etymologies,  cosmogonies,  allegories,  myths,  symbol¬ 
isms  between  all  heaven  and  earth,  might  she  not  introduce, — if  she 
could  but  banish  that  figure  of  Pelagia  dancing  to  it  all,  which  could 
not  be  banished,  but  hovered,  like  a  specter,  in  the  background  of  all 
her  imaginations.  She  became  quite  angry,  first  with  Pelagia,  then 
with  herself  for  being  weak  enough  to  think  of  her.  Was  it  not 
positive  defilement  of  her  mind  to  be  haunted  by  the  image  of  so  de¬ 
filed  a  being  ?  She  would  purify  her  thoughts  by  prayer  and  medi- 


281 


STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

tation.  But  to  wliom  of  all  tlie  gods  should  she  address  herself  ? 
To  her  chosen  favorite,  Athene?  She  who  had  promised  to  he  pres¬ 
ent  at  that  spectacle  ?  O,  how  weak  she  had  been  to  yield  !  And 
yet  she  had  been  snared  into  it.  Snared — there  was  no  doubt  of  it 
— by  the  very  man  whom  she  had  fancied  that  she  could  guide  and 
mold  to  her  own  purposes.  He  had  guided  and  molded  her  now 
against  her  self-respect,  her  compassion,  her  innate  sense  of  right. 
Already  she  was  his  tool.  True,  she  had  submitted  to  be  so  for  a 
great  purpose.  But  suppose  she  had  to  submit  again  hereafter, — 
always  henceforth  ?  And  what  made  the  thought  more  poignant  was 
her  knowledge  that  he  was  right  ;  that  he  knew  vdiat  to  do,  and 
how  to  do  it.  She  could  not  help  admiring  him  for  his  address,  his 
quickness,  his  clear  practical  insight ;  and  yet  she  despised,  mis¬ 
trusted,  all  but  hated  him.  But  what  if  his  were  the  very  qualities 
which  were  destined  to  succeed  ?  What  if  her  purer  and  loftier 
aims,  her  resolutions — now,  alas  !  broken — never  to  act  but  on  the 
deepest  and  holiest  principles  and  by  the  most  sacred  means,  were 
destined  never  to  exert  themselves  in  practice,  except  conjointly  with 
miserable  stratagems  and  cajoleries  such  as  these?  What  if  state¬ 
craft,  and  not  philosophy  and  religion,  were  the  appointed  rulers  of 
mankind?  Hideous  thought!  And  yet — she  who  had  all  her  life 
tried  to  be  self-dependent,  originative,  to  face  and  crush  the  hostile 
mob  of  circumstance  and  custom,  and  do  battle  single-handed  with 
Christianity  and  a  fallen  age — how  was  it  that  in  her  first  important 
and  critical  opportunity  of  action  she  had  been  dumb,  irresolute, 
passive,  the  victim,  at  last,  of  the  very  corruption  which  she  was  to 
exterminate  ?  She  did  not  know  yet  that  those  who  have  no  other 
means  for  regenerating  a  corrupted  time  than  dogmatic  pedantries 
concerning  the  dead  and  unreturning  past,  must  end,  in  practice,  by 
borrowing  insincerely,  and  using  clumsily,  the  very  weapons  of  that 
novel  age  which  they  deprecate,  and  “sewing  new  cloth  into  old 
garments,”  till  the  rent  becomes  patent  and  incurable.  But  in  the 
meanwhile,  such  meditations  as  these  drove  from  her  mind  for  that 
day  both  Athene,  and  the  ode,  and  philosophy,  and  all  things  but — 
Pelagia  the  wanton. 

In  the  meanwhile,  Alexandrian  politics  flowed  onward  in  their 
usual  pure  and  quiet  course.  The  public  buildings  were  placarded 
with  the  news  of  Heraclian’s  victory  ;  and  groups  of  loungers  ex¬ 
pressed  loudly  enough,  their  utter  indifference  as  to  who  might  rule 
at  Rome, — or  even  at  Byzantium.  Let  Heraclian  or  Honorius  be 
emperor,  the  capitals  must  be  fed  ;  and  while  the  Alexandrian  wheat- 
trade  was  uninjured,  what  matter  who  received  the  tribute?  Cer¬ 
tainly,  as  some  friends  of  Orestes  found  means  to  suggest,  it  might 
not  be  a  bad  thing  for  Egypt  if  she  could  keep  the  tribute  in  her  own 
treasury,  instead  of  sending  it  to  Rome  without  any  adequate  return, 

save  the  presence  of  an  expensive  army . Alexandria  had  been  once 

the  metropolis  of  an  independent  empire. . .  .Why  not  again  ?  Then 


came  enormous  largesses  of  corn,  proving,  more  satisfactorily  to  tli0 
mob  than  to  the  ship-owners,  that  Egyptian  wheat  was  better  em¬ 
ployed  at  home  than  abroad.  Nay,  there  were  even  rumors  of  a  general 
amnesty  for  all  prisoners  ;  and  as,  of  course,  every  evil-doer  had  a 
kind  of  friend,  who  considered  him  an  injured  martyr,  all  parties 
were  well  content,  on  their  own  accounts  at  least,  with  such  a  move. 

And  so  Orestes’s  bubble  swelled,  and  grew,  and  glittered  every  day 
with  fresh  prismatic  radiance ;  while  Hypatia  sat  at  home,  with  a 
heavy  heart,  writing  her  ode  to  Venus  Urania,  and  submitting  to 
Orestes’s  daily  visits. 

One  cloud,  indeed,  not  without  squalls  of  wind  and  rain,  disfigured 
that  sky  which  the  prefect  had  invested  with  such  serenity  by  the 
simple  expedient,  well  known  to  politicians,  of  painting  it  bright  blue, 
since  it  would  not  assume  that  color  of  its  own  accord.  For,  a  day  or 
two  after  Ammonius’s  execution,  the  prefect’s  guards  informed  him 
that  the  corpse  of  the  crucified  man,  with  the  cross  on  which  it  hung, 
had  vanished.  The  Nitrian  monks  had  come  down  in  a  body,  and 
carried  them  olT  before  the  very  eyes  of  the  sentinels.  Orestes  knew 
well  enough  that  the  fellows  must  have  been  bribed  to  allow  the 
theft ;  but  he  dare  not  say  so  to  men  on  whose  good-humor  his  very 
life  might  depend  ;  so,  stomaching  the  affront  as  best  he  could,  he 
vowed  fresh  vengeance  against  Cyril,  and  went  on  his  way.  But  be¬ 
hold  ! — within  four-and-twenty  hours  of  the  theft,  a  procession  of  all 
the  rascality,  followed  by  all  the  piety,  of  Alexandria, — monks  from 
Nitria  counted  by  the  thousand, — priests,  deacons,  archdeacons,  Cyril 
himself,  in  full  pontificals,  and,  borne  aloft  in  the  midst,  upon  a 
splendid  bier,  the  missing  corpse,  its  nail-pierced  hands  and  feet  left 
uncovered  for  the  pitying  gaze  of  the  Church. 

Under  the  very  palace  windows,  from  which  Orestes  found  it  ex¬ 
pedient  to  retire  for  the  time  being,  out  upon  the  quays,  and  up  the 
steps  of  the  Ciesareum,  defiled  that  new  portent  ;  and  in  another 
half-hour,  a  servant  entered,  breathlessly,  to  inform  the  shepherd  of 
the  people  that  his  victim  was  lying  in  state  in  the  center  of  the  nave; 
a  martyr  duly  canonized. — Ammonius  now  no  more,  but  henceforth 
Thaumasius  the  wonderful,  on  whose  heroic  virtues,  and  more  heroic 
faithfulness  unto  the  death,  Cyril  was  already  descanting  from  the 
pulpit,  amid  thunders  of  applause  at  every  allusion  to  Sisera  at  the 
brook  Kishon,  Sennacherib  in  the  house  of  Nisroch,  and  the  rest  of  the 
princes  of  this  world  who  come  to  naught. 

Here  was  a  storm  !  To  order  a  cohort  to  enter  the  church  and  bring 
away  the  body,  was  easy  enough  ;  to  make  them  do  it  in  the  face  of 
certain  death,  not  so  easy.  Besides,  it  was  too  early  yet  for  so  des¬ 
perate  a  move  as  would  be  involved  in  the  violation  of  a  church. . . . 
So  Orestes  added  this  fresh  item  to  the  long  column  of  accounts  which 
he  intended  to  settle  with  the  patriarch  ;  cursed  for  half  an  hour  in 
the  name  of  all  divinities,  saints,  and  martyrs,  Christian  and  Pagan  ; 
ftnd  wrote  off  a  lamentable  history  of  his  wrongs  and  sufferings  to  the 


233 


SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

very  Byz^n^’jie  court  against  wliicli  lie  was  about  to  rebel,  in  tlie  com- 
fortabl‘=!  assurance  that  Cyril  bad  sent,  by  the  same  post,  a  counter¬ 
statement,  contradicting  it  in  every  particular . Never  mind . 

case  he  failed  in  rebelling,  it  was  as  w^ell  to  be  able  to  prove  liis 
lUegiance  up  to  the  latest  possible  date  ;  and  the  more  completely 
ihe  two  statements  contradicted  each  other,  the  longer  it  w'ould  take 
io  sift  the  truth  out  of  them  ;  and  thus  so  much  time  was  gained,  and 
to  much  the  more  chance  meantime,  of  a  new  leaf  being  turned  over 
In  that  Sibylline  oracle  of  politicians,  the  Chapter  of  Accidents.  And, 
for  the  time  being,  he  would  make  a  pathetic  appeal  to  respectability 
and  moderation  in  general,  of  which  Alexandria,  wherein  some  hun¬ 
dred  thousand  tradesmen  and  merchants  had  property  to  lose,  pos¬ 
sessed  a  goodly  share. 

Respectability  responded  promptly  to  the  appeal  ;  and  loyal  ad¬ 
dresses  and  deputations  of  condolence  flowed  in  from  every  quarter, 
expressing  the  extreme  sorrow  with  which  the  citizens  had  beheld 
the  late  disturbances  of  civil  order,  and  the  contempt  which  had  been 
so  unfortunately  evinced  for  the  constituted  authorities  ;  but  taking, 
nevertheless,  the  liberty  to  remark,  that,  while  the  extreme  danger 
to  property  which  might  ensue  from  the  further  exasperation  of 
certain  classes  prevented  their  taking  those  active  sieps  on  the  side 
of  tranquillity  to  which  their  feelings  inclined  them,  the  known  piety 
and  wisdom  of  their  esteemed  patriarch  made  it  presumptuous  in 
them  to  offer  any  opinion  on  his  present  conduct,  beyond  the  ex¬ 
pression  of  their  firm  belief  that  he  had  been  unfortunately  misin¬ 
formed  as  to  those  sentiments  of  affection  and  respect  which  his  ex¬ 
cellency  the  prefect  was  well  known  to  entertain  toward  him.  They 
ventured,  therefore,  to  express  a  humble  hope  that,  by  some  mutual 
compromise,  to  define  which  would  be  an  unwarrantable  intrusion  on 
their  part,  a  happy  reconciliation  would  be  effected,  and  the  stability 
of  law,  property,  and  the  Catholic  faith  insured . All  which  Ores¬ 

tes  heard  with  blandest  smiles,  while  his  heart  was  black  with  curs¬ 
es  ;  and  Cyril  answered  by  a  very  violent,  though  a  very  true  and 
practical,  harangue  on  the  text,  “  How  hardly  shall  they  that  have 
riches  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven.” 

So  respectability  and  moderation  met  with  its  usual  hapless  fate, 
and,  soundly  cursed  by  both  parties,  in  the  vain  attempt  to  please 
both,  wisely  left  the  upper  powers  to  settle  their  own  affairs,  and 
went  home  to  their  desks  and  counters,  and  did  a  very  brisk  business 
all  that  week,  on  the  strength  of  the  approaching  festival.  One  hap¬ 
less  innkeeper  only  tried  to  carry  out  in  practice  the  principles  which 
the  deputation  from  his  guild  had  so  eloquently  advocated,  and  being 
convicted  of  giving  away  bread  in  the  morning  to  the  Nitrian  monks, 
and  wine  in  the  evening  to  the  prefect’s  guards,  had  his  tavern  gutted 
and  his  head  broken  by  a  joint  plebiscitum  of  both  the  parties  whom 
he  had  conciliated,  who  afterwards  fought  a  little  together,  and  then, 
luckily  for  the  general  peace,  mutually  ran  away  from  each  other. 


234 


IIYFATIA. 


Cyril  ill  tlie  meanwhile,  though  he  was  doing  a  foolish  thing,  was 
doing  it  wisely  enough.  Orestes  might  curse,  and  respectability 
might  deplore,  those  nightly  sermons,  which  shook  the  mighty  ar¬ 
cades  of  the  Caesareum,  but  they  could  not  answer  them.  Cyril  was 
right,  and  knew  that  he  was  right.  Orestes  was  a  scoundrel,  hateful 
to  God  and  to  the  enemies  of  God.  The  middle  classes  were  luke¬ 
warm,  covetous  cowards  ;  the  whole  system  of  government  was  a 
swindle  and  an  injustice  ;  all  men’s  hearts  were  mad  with  crying, 
“Lord,  how  long?”  The  fierce  bishop  had  only  to  thunder  forth 
text  on  text,  from  every  book  qf  Scripture,  old  and  new,  in  order  to 
array  on  his  side,  not  merely  the  common  sense  and  right  feeling,  but 
the  bigotry  and  ferocity  of  the  masses. 

In  vain  did  the  good  Arsenins  represent  to  him,  not  only  the 
scandal,  but  the  unrighteousness,  of  his  new  canonization.  “  I  must 
have  fuel,  my  good  father,”  was  his  answer,  “  wherewith  to  keep 
alight  the  flame  of  zeal.  If  I  am  to  be  silent  as  to  Heraclian’s  defeat,  I 
must  give  them  some  other  irritant,  which  will  put  them  in  a  proper 
temper  to  act  on  that  defeat,  when  they  are  told  of  it.  If  they  hate 
Orestes,  does  he  not  deserve  it  ?  Even  if  he  is  not  altogether  as  much 
in  the  wrong  in  this  particular  case  as  they  fancy  he  is,  are  there  not 
a  thousand  other  crimes  of  his,  which  deserve  their  abhorrence  even 
more  ?  At  all  events,  he  must  proclaim  the  empire,  as  you  yourself 
say,  or  we  shall  have  no  handle  against  him.  He  will  not  dare  to 
proclaim  it,  if  he  knows  that  we  are  aware  of  the  truth.  And  if  we 
are  to  keep  the  truth  in  reserve,  we  must  have  something  else  to  serve 
meanwhile  as  a  substitute  for  it.” 

And  poor  Arsenius  submitted  with  a  sigh,  as  he  saw  Cyril,  making 
a  fresh  step  in  that  alluring  path  of  evil-doing  that  good  might  come, 
which  led  him  in  after  years  into  many  a  fearful  sin,  and  left  his 
name  disgraced,  perhaps  forever,  in  the  judgment  of  generations, 
who  know  as  little  of  the  pandemonium  against  which  he  fought,  a? 
they  do  of  the  intense  belief  which  sustained  him  in  his  warfare  :  and 
who  have  therefore  neither  understanding  nor  pardon  for  the  occa¬ 
sional  outrages  and  errors  of  a  man  no  worse,  even  if  no  better,  than 
themselves. 


f  JHAPTER  XXI. 


VHE  SQUIRE-BISHOP. 

In  a  small  and  111  "turnislied  upper  room  of  a  fortified  country- 
lioiise,  sat  Synesius,  the  bishop  of  Cyrene. 

A  goblet  of  wine  stood  beside  him,  on  the  table,  but  it  was  un¬ 
tasted.  Slowly  and  sadly,  by  the  light  of  a  tiny  lamp,  he  went  on 
writing  a  verse  or  two,  and  then  burying  his  face  in  his  hand,  wliile 
hot  tears  dropped  between  his  fingers  on  the  paper  ;  till  a  servant 
entering,  announced  Raphael  Aben-Ezra, 

Synesius  rose,  with  a  gesture  of  surprise,  and  hurried  toward  the 
door.  “No,  ask  him  to  come  hither  to  me.  To  pass  through 
those  deserted  rooms  at  night  is  more  than  I  can  bear.”  And  he 
waited  for  his  guest  at  the  chamber-door,  and,  as  he  entered,  caught 
both  his  hands  in  his,  and  tried  to  speak  ;  but  his  voice  was  choked 
within  him. 

“Do  not  speak,”  said  Raphael,  gently,  leading  him  to  his  chair 
again.  “  I  know  all.” 

“  You  know  all?  And  are  you,  then,  so  unlike  the  rest  of  the 
world,  that  you  alone  have  come  to  visit  the  bereaved  and  the 
deserted  in  his  misery?” 

“  I  am  like  the  rest  of  the  world,  after  all ;  for  I  came  to  you  on 
my  own  selfish  errand,  to  seek  comfort.  Would  that  I  could  give  it 
instead  !  But  the  servants  told  me  all,  below.” 

“And  yet  you  persisted  in  seeing  me,  as  if  I  could  help  you? 
Alas  !  I  can  help  no  one  now.  Here  I  am  at  last  utterly  alone, 
utterly  helpless.  As  I  came  from  my  mother’s  womb,  so,  shall  I 
return  again.  My  last  child — my  last  and  fairest — gone  after  the 
rest ! — Thank  God,  that  I  have  had  even  a  day’s  peace  wherein  to  lay 
him  by  his  mother  and  his  brothers  ;  though  He  alone  knows  how 
long  the  beloved  graves  may  remain  unrifled.  Let  it  have  been 
shame  enough  to  sit  here  in  my  lonely  tower,  and  watch  the 
ashes  of  my  Spartan  ancestors,  the  sons  of  Hercules  himself,  my 
glory  and  my  pride,  sinful  fool  that  I  was  !  cast  to  the  winds  by 

barbarian  plunderers . When  wilt  thou  make  an  end,  O  Lord,  and 

slay  me  ?  ” 

“And  how  did  the  poor  boy  die?”  asked  Raphael,  in -hope  of 
soothing  sorrow  by  enticing  it  to  vent  itself  in  words. 

“  The  pestilence. — What  other  fate  can  we  expect  who  breathe 
an  air  tainted  with  corpses,  and  sit  under  a  sky  darkened  with 

(  235  ) 


236 


HYPATIA. 


carrion-birds  ?  Bat  I  could  endure  even  that,  if  I  could  work,  if  I 
could  help.  But  to  sit  here,  imprisoned  now  for  months  between 
these  hateful  towers  ;  night  after  night  to  watch  the  sky,  red  with 
burning  homesteads  ;  day  after  day  to  have  my  ears  ring  with  the 
shrieks  of  the  dying  and  the  captives, — for  they  have  begun  now  to 
murder  every  male,  down  to  the  baby  at  the  breast, — and  to  feel  my¬ 
self  utterly  fettered,  impotent,  sitting  here  like  some  palsied  idiot, 
waiting  for  my  end  ! — I  long  to  rush  out,  and  fall  fighting,  sword  in 
hand  :  but  I  am  their  last,  their  only  hope.  The  governors  care 
nothing  for  our  supplications.  In  vain  have  I  memorialized  Gen- 
nadius  and  Innocent,  with  what  little  eloquence  my  misery  has  not 
stunned  in  me.  But  there  is  no  resolution,  no  unanimity  left  in  the 
land.  The  soldiery  are  scattered  in  small  garrisons,  employed  en¬ 
tirely  in  protecting  the  private  property  of  their  officers.  The 
Ausurians  defeat  them  piecemeal,  and,  armed  with  their  spoils, 
actually  have  begun  to  beleaguer  fortified  towns  ;  and  now  there  is 
nothing  left  for  us,  but  to  pray  that,  like  Ulysses,  we  may  be  devoured 
the  last.  What  am  I  doing  ?  I  am  selfishly  pouring  out  my  own 
sorrows,  instead  of  listening  to  yours.’’ 

“Nay,  friend,  you  are  talking  of  the  sorrows  of  your  country,  not 
of  your  own.  As  for  me,  I  have  no  sorrow, — only  a  despair  :  which, 
being  irremediable,  may  well  wait.  But  you — 0,  you  must  not  stay 
here.  Why  not  escape  to  Alexandria  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  I  will  die  at  my  post,  as  I  have  lived,  the  father  of  my  people. 
When  the  last  rain  comes,  and  Gyrene  itself  is  besieged,  I  shall  re¬ 
turn  thither  from  my  present  outpost,  and  the  conquerors  shall  find 
the  bishop  in  his  place  before  the  altar.  There  I  hav^e  offered  for 
years  the  unbloody  sacrifice  to  Him,  who  will  perhaps  require  of  me 
a  bloody  one,  that  so  the.  sight  of  an  altar  polluted  by  the  murder  of 
his  priest  may  end  the  sum  of  Pentapolitan  woe,  and  arouse  Him  to 
avenge  his  slaughtered  sheep  !  There,  we  will  talk  no  more  of  it. 
This  at  least  I  have  left  in  my  power,  to  make  you  welcome.  And 
after  supper  you  shall  tell  me  what  brings  you  hither.” 

And  the  good  bishop,  calling  his  servants,  set  to  work  to  show  his 
guest  such  hospitality  as  the  invaders  had  left  in  his  power. 

Raphael’s  usual  insight  had  not  deserted  him,  when,  in  his  utter 
X^erplexity,  he  went,  almost  instinctively,  straight  to  Synesius.  The 
Bishop  of  Gyrene,  to  judge  from  the  charming  private  le  tters  which 
he  has  left,  was  one  of  those  many-sided,  volatile,  restless  men,  who 
taste  joy  and  sorrow,  if  not  deeply  or  permanently,  yet  abundantly 
and  passionately.  He  lived,  as  Raphael  had  told  Orestes,  in  a  whirl¬ 
wind  of  good  deeds,  meddling  and  toiling  for  the  mere  pleasure  of 
action  ;  and  as  soon  as  there  was  nothing  to  be  done,  which,  till 
lately,  had  happened  seldom  enough  with  him,  paid  the  penalty  for 
past  excitement  in  fits  of  melancholy.  A  man  of  magniloquent  and 
flowery  style,  not  without  a  vein  of  self-conceit  ;  yet  withal  of 
overflowing  kindliness,  racy  humor,  and  unflinching  courage,  both 


THE  SqUIRE-BISMOP.  967 

physical  and  moral,  with  a  very  clear  practical  faculty,  and  a  very 
muddy  speculative  one, — though,  of  course,  like  the  rest  of  the 
world,  he  was  especially  proud  of  his  own  weakest  side,  and  professed 
the  most  passionate  affection  for  philosophic  meditation  ;  while  his 
detractors  hinted,  not  without  a  show  of  reason,  that  he  was  far  more 
of  an  adept  in  soldiering  and  dog- breaking  than  in  the  mysteries  of 
the  unseen  world. 

To  him  Raphael  betook  himself,  he  hardly  knew  why  ;  certainly 
no'  for  philosophic  consolation  ;  perhaps  because  Synesius  was,  as 
Raphael  used  to  say,  the  only  Christian  from  whom  he  had  ever 
heard  a  hearty  laugh  ;  perhaps  because  he  had  some  wayward  hope, 
unconfessed  even  to  himself,  that  he  might  meet  at  Synesius’s  house 
the  very  companions  from  whom  he  had  just  tied.  He  was  fluttering 
round  Victoria’s  new  and  strange  brilliance,  like  a  moth  round  the 
candle,  as  he  confessed,  after  supper,  to  his  host  ;  and  now  he  was 
come  hither,  on  the  chance  of  being  able  to  singe  his  wings  once  more. 

Not  that  his  confession  was  extracted  without  much  trouble  to  the 
good  old  man,  who,  seeing  at  once  that  Raphael  had  some  weight 
upon  his  mind,  which  he  longed  to  tell,  and  yet  was  either  too  sus¬ 
picious  or  too  proud  to  tell,  set  himself  to  ferret  out  the  secret,  and 
forgot  all  his  sorrows  for  the  time,  as  soon  as  he  found  a  human  be¬ 
ing  to  whom  he  might  do  good.  But  Raphael  was  inexplicably  way¬ 
ward  and  unlike  himself.  All  his  smooth  and  shallow  persiflage,  even 
his  smooth  satiric  humor,  had  vanished.  He  seemed  parched  by  some 
inward  fever  ;  restless,  moody,  abrupt,  even  peevish  ;  and  Synesius’s 
curiosity  rose  with  his  disappointment,  as  Raphael  went  on  obsti¬ 
nately  declining  to  consult  the  very  physician  before  whom  he  had 
presented  himself  as  patient. 

“  And  what  can  you  do  for  me  if  I  did  tell  you?” 

“  Then  allow  me,  my  very  dear  friend,  to  ask  this.  As  you  deny 
having  visited  me  on  my  own  account,  on  what  account  did  you  visit 
me?  ” 

“Can  you  ask?  To  enjoy  the  society  of  the  most  finished  gentle¬ 
man  of  Pentapolis.” 

“And  was  that  worth  a  week’s  journey,  in  perpetual  danger  of 
death  ?  ” 

“  As  for  danger  of  death,  that  weighs  little  with  a  man  who  is 
careless  of  life.  And  as  for  the  week’s  journey,  I  had  a  dream  one 
night  on  my  way  which  made  me  question  whether  I  were  wise  in 
troubling  a  Christian  bishop  with  any  thoughts  or  questions  which 
relate  merely  to  poor  human  beings  like  myself,  who  marry  and  are 
given  in  marriage.” 

“  You  forget,  friend,  that  you  are  speaking  to  one  who  has  married, 
and  loved, — and  lost.” 

“  I  did  not.  But  you  see  how  rude  I  am  growing.  I  am  no  fit 
company  for  you,  or  any  man.  I  believe  I  shall  end  by  turning 
robber-chief,  and  heading  a  party  of  Ausurians.” 


238 


HYPATIA. 


“  But,”  said  the  patient  Synesius,  “  you  have  forgotten  your  dream 
all  this  while.” 

“  Forgotten  !  I  did  not  promise  to  tell  it  you, — did  I  ?” 

“  No  ;  hut  as  it  seems  to  have  contained  some  sort  of  accusation 
against  my  capacity,  do  you  not  think  it  but  fair  to  tell  the  accused 
what  it  was  ?  ” 

Raphael  smiled. 

“  Well  then.  .  .  .Suppose  I  had  dreamed  this.  That  a  philosopher, 
an  academic,  and  a  believer  in  nothing  and  in  no  man,  had  met  at 
idi  Berenice  certain  rabbis  of  the  Jews,  and  heard  them  reading  and  ex- 
a  pounding  a  certain  book  of  Solomon, — the  Song  of  Songs.  You,  as  a 

r  loarned  man,  know  into  what  sort  of  trumpery  allegory  they  would 

contrive  to  twist  it ;  how  the  bride’s  eyes  were  to  mean  the  scribes 
who  were  full  of  wisdom,  as  the  pools  of  Ileshbon  were  of  water  ;  and 
her  stature  spreading  like  a  palm-tree,  the  priests  who  spread  out 
their  hands  when  blessing  the  people  ;  and  the  left  hand  which 
t  should  be  under  her  head,  the  Tephilim  which  these  old  pedants  wore 

r  on  their  left  wrists  ;  and  the  right  hand  which  should  hold  her,  the 

‘  Mezuzah  which  they  fixed  on  the  right  side  of  their  doors  to  keep  oif 

devils  ;  and  so  forth.” 

5  “  I  have  heard  such  silly  Cabbalisms,  certainly.” 

“You  have  ?  Then  suppose  that  I  went  on,  and  saw  in  my  dream 
..  how  this  same  academic  and  unbeliever,  being  himself  also  a  Hebrew 
of  the  Hebrews,  snatched  the  roll  out  of  the  rabbi’s  hand,  and  told 
them  that  they  were  a  party  of  fools  for  trying  to  set  forth  what  the 
book  might  possibly  mean,  before  they  had  found  out  what  it  really 
did  mean  ;  and  that  they  could  only  find  out  that  by  looking  honestly 
at  the  plain  words  to  see  what  Solomon  meant  by  it.  And  then,  sup¬ 
pose  that  this  same  apostate  Jew,  this  member  of  the  synagogue  of 
Satan,  in  liis  carnal  and  lawless  imaginations,  had  waxed  eloquent 
with  the  eloquence  of  devils,  and  fold  them  that  the  book  set  forth, 
to  those  who  had  eyes  to  see,  how  Solomon  the  great  king,  with  his 
threescore  queens,  and  fourscore  concubines,  and  virgins  without 
number,  forgets  all  his  seraglio  and  his  luxury  in  pure  and  noble  love 
for  the  undefiled,  who  is  but  one  ;  and  how,  as  his  eyes  are  opened 
to  see  that  God  made  the  one  man  for  the  one  woman,  and  the  one 
woman  to  the  one  man,  even  as  it  was  in  the  garden  of  Eden,  so  all 
his  heart  and  thoughts  become  pure,  and  gentle,  and  simple  ;  how 
the  song  of  the  birds,  and  the  scent  of  tlie  grapes,  and  the  spicy 
southern  gales,  and  all  the  simple  country  pleasures  of  the  glens  of 
Lebanon,  which  he  shares  with  his  own  vine- dressers  and  slaves,  be¬ 
come  more  precious  in  his  eyes  than  all  his  palaces  and  artificial 
pomp  ;  and  the  man  feels  that  he  is  in  harmony,  for  the  first  time  in 
his  life,  with  the  universe  of  God,  and  with  the  mystery  of  the  seasons  ; 
that  within  him,  as  well  as  without  him,  the  winter  is  past,  and  the 
rain  is  over  and  gone  ;  the  flowers  appear  on  the  earth,  and  the  voice 
of  the  turtle  is  heard  in  the  land . And  suppose  I  saw  in  my  dream 


m 


THE  SQUIRE- BISHOP. 

how  the  rabbis,  when  they  heard  those  wicked  words,  stopped  their 
ears  with  one  accord,  and  ran  upon  that  son  of  Belial  and  cast  him 
out,  because  he  blasphemed  their  sacred  books  by  his  carnal  inter¬ 
pretations.  And  suppose — I  only  say  suppose — that  I  saw  in  my 
dream  how  the  poor  man  said  in  his  heart,  ‘  I  will  go  to  the  Christians  ; 
they  acknowledge  the  sacredness  of  this  same  book  ;  and  they  say 
that  God  taught  them  that  “  in  the  beginning  God  made  man,  male 
and  female.”  Perhaps  they  will  tell  me  whether  this  Song  of  Songs 
does  not,  as  it  seems  to  me  to  do,  show  the  passage  upward  from 
brutal  polygamy  to  that  monogomy  which  they  so  solemnly  command, 
and  agree  with  me,  that  it  is  because  the  Song  preaches  this  that  it 
has  a  right  to  take  its  place  among  the  holy  writings  ?  ’  You,  as  a 
Christian  bishop,  should  know  what  answer  such  a  man  would  re¬ 
ceive . You  are  silent  ?  Then  I  will  tell  you  what  answer  he  seemed 

to  receive  in  my  dream.  ‘  O  blasphemous  and  carnal  man,  who  per- 
vertest  Holy  Scripture  into  a  cloak  for  thine  own  licentiousness,  as  if 
it  spoke  of  man’s  base  and  sensual  affections,  know  that  this  book  is 
to  be  spiritually  interpreted  of  the  marriage  between  the  soul  and  its 
Creator,  and  that  it  is  from  this  very  book  that  the  Catholic  Church 
derives  her  strongest  arguments  in  favor  of  holy  virginity,  and  the 
glories  of  a  celibate  life.’  ” 

Synesius  was  still  silent. 

“  And  what  do  you  think  I  saw  in  my  dream  that  that  man  did, 
when  he  found  these  Christians  enforcing,  as  a  necessary  article  of 
practice,  as  well  as  of  faith,  a  baseless  and  bombastic  metaphor,  bor¬ 
rowed  from  that  very  Neo-Platonism  out  of  which  he  had  just  fled 
for  his  life  ?  He  cursed  the  day  he  was  born,  and  the  hour  in  which 
his  father  was  told,  ‘  Thou  hast  gotten  a  man-child,’  and  said,  ‘  Phil¬ 
osophers,  Jews,  and  Christians,  farewell  for  ever  and  a  day  !  The 
clearest  words  of  your  most  sacred  books  mean  anything  or  nothing, 
as  the  case  may  suit  your  fancies  ;  and  there  is  neither  truth  nor  rea¬ 
son  under  the  sun.  What  better  is  there  for  a  man,  than  to  follow 
the  example  of  his  people,  and  to  turn  usurer,  and  money-getter., 
and  cajoler  of  fools  in  his  turn,  even  as  his  father  was  before 
him  ?  ’  ” 

Synesius  remained  awhile  in  deep  thought,  and  at  last, — 

“  And  yet  you  came  to  me?” 

“  I  did,  because  you  have  loved  and  married;  because  you  have 
stood  out  manfully  against  this  strange  modern  insanity,  and  refused 
to  give  up,  when  you  were  made  a  bishop,  the  wife  whom  God  had 
given  you.  You,  I  thought,  could  solve  the  riddle  for  me,  if  any  man 
could.” 

“Alas,  friend  !  I  have  begun  to  distrust,  of  late,  my  power  of 
solving  riddles.  After  all,  why  should  they  be  solved  ?  What  mat¬ 
ters  one  more  mystery  in  a  world  of  mysteries  ?  ‘  If  thou  marry, 

thou  hast  not  sinned,’  are  St.  Paul’s  own  words  ;  and  l,et  them  be 
enough  for  us,  Po  not  ask  ine  to  argue  with  you,  but  to  help  you. 


240 


HYPATIA. 


Instead  of  puzzling  me  witli  deep  questions,  and  tempting  me  to  set 
up  my  private  judgment,  as  I  have  done  too  often  already,  against 
the  opinion  of  the  Church,  tell  me  your  story,  and  test  my  sympathy 
rather  than  my  intellect.  I  shall  feel  with  you  and  work  for  you, 
doubt  not,  even  though  I  am  unable  to  explain  to  myself  why  I 
do  it.’’ 

“  Then  you  cannot  solve  my  riddle  ?  ” 

“  Let  me  help  you,”  said  Synesius,  with  a  sweet  smile,  “  to  solve 
it  for  yourself.  You  need  not  try  to  deceive  me.  You  have  a  love, 
an  undefiled,  who  is  but  one.  When  you  possess  her,  you  will  be 
able  to  judge  better  whether  your  interpretation  of  the  Song  is 
the  true  one  ;  and  if  you  still  think  that  it  is,  Synesius,  at  least,  will 
have  no  quarrel  against  you.  He  has  always  claimed  for  himself  the 
right  of  philosophizing  in  private,  and  he  will  allow  the  same  liberty 
to  you,  whether  the  mob  do  or  not.” 

“  Then  you  agree  with  me  ?  Of  course  you  do  !  ” 

“  Is  it  fair  to  ask  me  whether  I  accept  a  novel  interpretation,  which 
I  have  only  heard  five  minutes  ago,  delivered  in  a  somewhat  hasty 
and  rhetorical  form?” 

“  You  are  shirking  the  question,”  said  Raphael,  peevishly. 

“  And  what  if  1  am  ?  Tell  me,  point-blank,  most  self-tormenting 
of  men,  can  I  help  you  in  practice,  even  though  I  choose  to  leave  you 
to  yourself  in  speculation  ?  ” 

“  Well,  then,  if  you  will  have  my  story,  take  it,  and  judge  for 
yourself  of  Christian  common  sense.” 

And  hurriedly,  as  if  ashamed  of  his  own  confession,  and  yet 
compelled,  in  spite  of  himself,  to  unbosom  it,  he  told  Synesius  all, 
from  his  first  meeting  with  Victoria  to  his  escape  from  her  at  Ber¬ 
enice. 

The  good  bishop,  to  Aben-Ezra’s  surprise,  seemed  to  treat  the 
whole  matter  as  infinitely  amusing.  He  chuckled,  smote  his  hand 
on  his  thigh,  and  nodded  approval  at  every  pause, — perhaps  to  give 
the  speaker  courage, — perhaps  because  he  really  thought  that  Ra¬ 
phael’s  prospects  were  considerably  less  desperate  than  he  fan¬ 
cied . 

“If  you  laugh  at  me,  Synesius,  I  am  silent.  It  is  quite  enough  to 
endure  the  humiliation  of  telling  you  that  I  am — confound  it  ! — like 
any  boy  of  sixteen.” 

“  Laugh  at  you  ? — with  you,'  you  mean.  A  convent  ?  Pooh,  pooh  ! 
The  old  prefect  has  enough  ^ense,  I  will  warrant  him,  not  to  refuse 
a  good  match  for  his  child.” 

“  You  forget  that  I  have  not  the  honor  of  being  a  Christian.” 

“  Then  we’ll  make  you  one.  You  won’t  let  me  convert  you,  I 
know  ;  you  always  used  to  gibe  and  jeer  at  my  philosophy.  But 
Augustine  comes  to-morrow.” 

“Augustine?” 

‘  ‘  He  doe^  indeed  ;  and  we  must  be  off  by  daybreak,  with  all  the 


TSE  SQtriEE-BISHOP.  Ui 

armed  men  we  can  muster,  to  meet  and  escort  liim,  and  to  hunt,  of 
course,  going  and  coming  ;  for  we  have  had  no  food  this  fortnight 
but  what  our  own  dogs  and  bows  have  furnished  us.  He  shall  take 
you  in  hand,  and  cure  you  of  all  your  Judaism  in  a  week  ;  and  then 
just  leave  the  rest  to  me  ;  I  will  manage  it  somehow  or  other.  It  is 
sure  to  come  right.  No  ;  do  not  be  bashful.  It  will  be  real  amuse¬ 
ment  to  a  poor  wretch  who  can  find  nothing  else  to  do  ; — heigh-ho  ! 
And  as  for  lying  under  an  obligation  to  me,  why  we  can  square  that 
by  your  lending  me  three  or  four  thousand  gold  pieces — Heaven 
knows  I  want  them  ! — on  the  certainty  of  never  seeing  them  again.” 

Raphael  could  not  help  laughing  in  his  turn. 

“  Synesius  is  himself  still,  I  see,  and  not  unworthy  of  his  ancestor 
Hercules  ;  and,  though  he  shrinks  from  cleansing  the  Augean  stable 
of  my  soul,  paws  like  the  war-horse  in  the  valley  at  the  hope  of  un¬ 
dertaking  any  lesser  labors  in  my  behalf.  But,  my  dear  generous 
bishop,  this  matter  is  more  serious,  and  I,  the  subject  of  it,  have  be¬ 
come  more  serious  also,  than  you  fancy.  Consider  :  by  the  uncorrupt 
honor  of  your  Spartan  forefathers,  Agis,  Brasidas,  and  the  rest  of  them, 
don’t  you  think  that  you  are,  in  your  hasty  kindness,  tempting  me  to 
behave  in  a  way  which  they  would  have  called  somewhat  rascally  ?  ” 

“  How  then,  my  dear  man  ?  You  have  a  very  honorable  and  praise¬ 
worthy  desire,  and  I  am  willing  to  help  you  to  compass  it.” 

“  Ho  you  think  that  I  have  not  cast  about  before  now  for  more  than 
one  method  of  compassing  it  for  myself  ?  My  good  man,  I  have  been 
tempted  about  a  dozen  times  already  to  turn  Christian  :  but  there 
has  risen  up  in  me  the  strangest  fancy  about  conscience  and  honor 

. I  never  was  scrupulous  before.  Heaven  knows  ;  I  am  not  over- 

scrupulous  now, — except  about  her.  I  cannot  dissemble  before  her.  I 

dare  not  look  in  her  face  when  I  had  a  lie  in  my  right  hand . She 

looks  through  one, — into  one, — like  a  clear-eyed  awful  goddess . 

I  never  was  ashamed  in  my  life  till  my  eyes  met  hers.” 

“  But  if  you  really  became  a  Christian  ?  ” 

“  I  cannot.  I  should  suspect  my  own  motives.  Here  is  another  of 
these  absurd  soul-anatomizing  scruples  which  have  risen  up  in  me. 

I  should  suspect  that  I  had  changed  my  creed  because  I  wished  to 
change  it,  that,  if  I  was  not  deceiving  her,  I  was  deceiving  myself. 
If  I  had  not  loved  her  it  might  have  been  different ;  but  now,  just 
because  I  do  love  her,  I  will  not,  I  dare  not,  listen  to  Augustine’s  argu¬ 
ments,  or  my  own  thoughts  on  the  matter.” 

“  Most  wayward  of  men  !”  cried  Synesius,  hal f- peevishly ;  “  You 
seem  to  take  some  perverse  pleasure  in  throwing  yourself  into  the 
waves  again,  the  instant  you  have  climbed  a  rock  of  refuge  !  ” 

“Pleasure?  is  there  any  pleasure  in  feeling  one’s  self  at  death- 
grips  with  the  Devil  ?  I  had  given  up  believing  in  him  for  many  a 

year . And  behold,  the  moment  that  I  awaken  to  anything  noble 

and  right,  I  find  the  old  serpent  live  and  strong  at  my  throat  !  No 
wonder  that  I  suspect  him,  you,  myself, — I,  who  have  been  tempted 


HYPATIA. 


every  hour  in  the  last  week,  temptations  to  become  a  devil.  Ay,” 
he  went  on,  raising  his  voice,  as  all  the  fire  of  his  intense  Eastern 
nature  fiashed  from  his  black  eyes,  “  to  be  a  devil  !  From  my  child¬ 
hood  till  now  never  have  I  known  what  it  was  to  desire,  and  not  to 
possess.  It  is  not  often  that  I  have  had  to  trouble  any  poor  Naboth 
for  his  vineyard  ;  but  when  I  have  taken  a  fancy  to  it,  Naboth  has 

always  found  it  wiser  to  give  way.  And  now . Do  you  fancy  that 

I  have  not  had  a  dozen  hellish  plots  hashing  across  me  in  the 
last  week  ?  Look  here  !  This  is  the  mortgage  of  her  father’s  whole 
estate.  I  bought  it — whether  by  the  instigation  of  Satan  or  of  God 
— of  a  banker  in  Berenice,  the  very  day  I  left  them  ;  and  now 
they,  and  every  straw  wdiich  they  possess,  are  in  my  power.  I  can 
ruin  them, — sell  them  as  slaves, — betray  them  to  death  as  rebels, — 
and  last,  but  not  least,  cannot  I  hire  a  dozen  worthy  men  to  carry  her 
off,  and  cut  the  Gordian  knot  most  simply  and  summarily  ?  And  yet 
I  dare  not  !  I  must  be  pure,  to  approach  the  pure  ;  and  righteous, 
to  kiss  the  feet  of  the  righteous.  Whence  came  this  new  conscience 
to  me  I  know  not  ;  but  come  it  has  ;  and  I  dare  no  more  do  a  base 
thing  toward  her,  than  I  dare  toward  a  God,  if  there  be  one.  This 
very  mortgage, — I  hate  it,  curse  it,  now  that  I  possess  it, — the  tempt¬ 
ing  devil  !  ” 

“  Burn  it,”  said  Synesius,  quietly. 

‘  ‘  Perhaps  I  may.  At  least,  used  it  never  shall  be.  Compel  her  ? 
I  am  too  proud,  or  too  honorable,  or  something  or  other,  even  to  solic¬ 
it  her.  She  must  come  to  me  ;  tell  me  with  her  own  lips  that  she 
loves  me,  that  she  will  take  me,  and  make  me  worthy  of  her.  She 
must  have  mercy  on  me,  of  her  own  free  will ,  or — let  her  pine  and 
die  in  that  accursed  prison  ;  and  then  a  scratch  with  the  trusty  old 
dagger  for  her  father,  and  another  for  myself,  will  save  him  from 
any  more  superstitions,  and  me  from  any  more  philosophic  doubts, 
for  a  few  aeons  of  ages,  till  we  start  again  in  new  lives, — he,  I  sup¬ 
pose,  as  a  jackass,  and  I  as  a  baboon.  What  matter?  but  unless  I 
possess  her  by  fair  means,  God  do  so  to  me,  and  more  also,  if  I  at¬ 
tempt  base  ones  !  ” 

“  God  be  with  you,  my  son,  in  the  noble  warfare,”  said  Synesius, 
his  eyes  filling  with  kindly  tears. 

“It  is  no  noble  warfare  at  all.  It  is  a  base,  coward  fear,  in  one 
who  never  before  feared  man  or  devil,  and  is  now  fallen  low  enough 
to  be  afraid  of  a  helpless  girl  !  ” 

“Not  so,”  cried  Synesius  in  his  turn;  “it  is  a  noble  and  a  holy  fear. 
You  fear  her  goodness.  Could  you  see  her  goodness,  much  less  fear 
it,  were  there  not  a  Divine  Light  within  you  which  showed  you 
what,  and  how  awful,  goodness  was  ?  Tell  me  no  more,  Eaphael 
Aben-Ezra,  that  you  do  not  fear  God ;  for  he  who  fears  Virtue, 

fears  Him  whose  likeness  Virtue  is.  Go  on, — go  on . Be 

brave,  and  His  strength  will  be  made  manifest  in  your  weakness.” 
***** 


^niE  SqUIRE-BiSHOP.  ^3 

It  was  late  tliat  niglit  before  Synesius  compelled  liis  guest  to  re¬ 
tire,  after  having  warned  him  not  to  disturb  himself  if  he  heard  the 
alarm-bell  ring,  as  the  house  was  well  garrisoned,  and  having  set  the 
water-clock  by  which  he  and  his  servants  measured  their  respective 
watches.  And  then  the  good  bishop,  having  disposed  his  sentinels, 
took  his  station  on  the  top  of  his  tower,  close  by  the  warning-bell  ; 
and  as  he  looked  out  over  the  broad  lands  of  his  forefathers,  and 
prayed  that  their  desolation  might  come  to  an  end  at  last,  he  did  not 
forget  to  pray  for  the'  desolation  of  the  guest  who  slept  below,  a 
happier  and  more  healthy  slumber  than  he  had  known  for  many  a 
week.  For  before  Raphael  lay  down  that  night,  he  had  torn  to  shred» 
Majoricus’s  mortgage,  and  felt  a  lighter  and  a  better  man  as  he  saw 
the  cunning  temptation  consuming  scrap  by  scrap  in  the  lamp-flame. 
And  then,  wearied  out  with  fatigue  of  body  and  mind,  he  forgot 
Synesius,  Victoria,  and  the  rest,  and  seemed  to  himself  to  wander  all 
night  among  the  vine-clad  glens  of  Lebanon,  amid  the  gardens  of 
lilies  and  the  beds  of  spices  ;  while  shepherd’s  music  lured  him  on 
and  on,  and  girlish  voices,  chanting  the  mystic  idyl  of  his  mighty  an¬ 
cestor,  rung  soft  and  fitful  through  his  weary  brain. 

*  *  *  *  * 

Before  sunrise  the  next  morning,  Raphael  was  faring  forth  gal¬ 
lantly,  well  armed  and  mounted,  by  Synesius’s  side,  followed  by  four 
or  five  brace  of  tall,  brush  tailed  greyhounds,  and  by  the  faithful 
Bran,  whose  lop-ears  and  heavy  jaws,  unique  in  that  land  of  prick- 
ears  and  fox-noses,  formed  the  absorbing  subject  of  conversation 
among  some  twenty  smart  retainers,  who,  armed  to  the  teeth  for 
chase  and  war,  rode  behind  the  bishop  on  half-starved,  raw-boned 
horses,  inured  by  desert  training  and  bad  times  to  do  the  maximum 
of  work  upon  the  minimum  of  food. 

For  the  first  few  miles  they  rode  in  silence  ;  through  ruined  vil¬ 
lages,  and  desolated  farms,  from  which  here  and  there  a  single  in¬ 
habitant  peeped  forth  fearfully,  to  pour  his  tale  of  woe  into  the  ears 
of  the  hapless  bishop,  and  then,  instead  of  asking  alms  from  him,  to 
entreat  his  acceptance  of  some  paltry  remnant  of  grain  or  poultry, 
which  had  escaped  the  hands  of  the  marauders  ;  and  as  they  clung 
to  his  hands,  and  blessed  him  as  their  only  hope  and  stay,  poor 
Synesius  heard  patiently  again  and  again  the  same  purposeless  tale 
of  woe,  and  mingled  his  tears  with  theirs,  and  then  spurred  his 
horse  on  impatiently,  as  if  to  escape  from  the  sight  of  misery  which 
he  could  not  relieve  ;  while  a  voice  in  Raphael’s  heart  seemed  to  ask 
him, — “  Why  was  thy  wealth  given  to  thee,  but  that  thou  mightest 
dry,  if  but  for  a  day,  such  tears  as  these?  ” 

And  he  fell  into  a  meditation,  which  was  not  without  its  fruit  in 
due  season,  but  which  lasted  till  they  had  left  the  inclosed  country, 
and  were  climbing  the  slopes  of  the  low  rolling  hills,  over  which  lay 
the  road  from  the  distant  sea.  But  as  they  left  the  signs  of  war  be¬ 
hind  them,  the  volatile  temper  of  the  good  bishop  began  to  rise.  He 


Ui 


EtTPATtA. 


petted  his  hounds,  'chatted  to  his  men,  discoursed  on  the  most 
probable  quarter  for  finding  game,  and  exhorted  them  cheerfully 
enough  to  play  the  man,  as  their  chance  of  having  anything  to  eat 
at  night  depended  entirely  on  their  prowess  during  the  day. 

“  Ah,”  said  Raphael  at  last,  glad  of  a  pretext  for  breaking  his  own 
chain  of  painful  thought,  “  there  is  a  vein  of  your  land-salt.  I  sus¬ 
pect  that  you  were  all  at  the  bottom  of  the  sea  once,  and  that  the  old 
earth-shaker,  Neptune,  tired  of  your  bad  ways,  gave  you  a  lift  one 
morning,  and  set  you  up  as  dry  land,  in  order  to  be  rid  of  you.” 

“  It  may  really  be  so.  They  say  that  the  Argonauts  returned  back 
through  this  country  from  the  Southern  Ocean,  which  must  have 
been  therefore  far  nearer  us  than  it  is  now,  and  that  they  carried 
their  mystic  vessel  over  these  very  hills  to  the  Syrtis.  However,  we 
have  forgotten  all  about  the  sea  thoroughly  enough  since  that  time. 
I  well  remember  my  first  astonishment  at  the  sight  of  a  galley,  in 
Alexandria,  and  the  roar  of  laughter  with  which  my  fellow-students 
greeted  my  not  unreasonable  remark,  that  it  looked  very  lilae  a  cen¬ 
tipede.” 

“And  do  you  recollect,  too,  the  argument  which  I  had  once  with 
your  steward  about  the  pickled  fish  which  I  brought  you  from 
Egypt ;  and  the  way  in  which,  when  the  jar  was  opened,  the  servants 
shrieked  and  ran  right  and  left,  declaring  that  the  fish-bones  were 
the  spines  of  poisonous  serpents?” 

“  The  old  fellow  is  as  obstinate  as  ever,  I  assure  you,  in  his  disbe^ 
lief  in  salt  water.  He  torments  me  continually  by  asking  me  to  tell 
him  the  story  of  my  shipwreck,  and  does  not  believe  me  after  all, 
though  he  has  heard  it  a  dozen  times.  ‘  Sir,’  he  said  to  me  solemnly, 
after  you  were  gone,  ‘  will  that  strange  gentleman  pretend  to  per¬ 
suade  me  that  anything  eatable  can  come  out  of  his  great  pond  there 
at  Alexandria,  when  ■every  one  can  see  that  the  best  fountain  in  the 
country  never  breeds  anything  but  frogs  and  leeches  ?  ’  ” 

As  he  spoke  they  left  the  last  field  behind  them,  and  entered  upon 
a  vast  sheet  of  breezy  down,  speckled  with  shrubs  and  copse,  and 
split  here  and  there  by  rocky  glens,  ending  in  fertile  valleys,  once 
thick  with  farms  and  homesteads. 

“  Here,”  cried  Synesius,  “are  our  hunting-grounds.  And  now  for 
one  hour’s  forgetfulness,  and  the  joys  of  the  noble  art  !  What  could 
old  Homer  have  been  thinking  of  when  he  forgot  to  number  it 
among  the  pursuits  which  are  glorious  to  heroes,  and  make  man 
illustrious,  and  yet  could  laud  in  those  very  words  the  forum?” 

“  The  forum?”  said  Raphael.  “  I  never  saw  it  yet  make  men  any¬ 
thing  but  rascals.” 

“Brazen-faced  rascals,  my  friend.  1  detest  the  whole  breed  of 
lawyers,  and  never  meet  one  without  turning  him  into  ridicule  ; 
effeminate  pettifoggers,  who  shudder  at  the  very  sight  of  roast  veni¬ 
son,  when  they  think  of  the  dangers  by  which  it  has  been  procured. 
But  it  is  a  cowardly  age,  my  friend, — a  cowardly  age.  Let  us  forget 
it,  and  ourselves,” 


TUB  SQ  nmB-BisnoP.  MS 

**  And  even  pliilosopliy  and  Hypatia  ?  ”  said  Raphael,  archly. 

“  I  have  done  with  philosophy.  To  fight  like  an  Heracleid,  and  to 
die  like  a  bishop,  is  all  I  have  left, — except  Hypatia,  the  perfect,  the 
wise  !  I  tell  you,  friend,  it  is  a  comfort  to  me,  even  in  my  deep¬ 
est  misery,  to  recollect  that  the  corrupt  world  yet  holds  one  being  so 
divine - ” 

And  he  was  running  on  in  one  of  his  high-flown  laudations  of  his 
idol,  when  Raphael  checked  him. 

“  I  fear  our  common  sympathy  on  that  subject  is  rather  weakened. 
I  have  begun  to  doubt  her  lately  nearly  as  much  as  I  doubt  philoso- 
phy.” 

“Not  her  virtue ? ” 

“  No,  friend  ;  nor  her  beauty,  nor  her  wisdom  ;  simply  her  power 
of  making  me  a  better  man.  A  selfish  criterion,  you  will  say.  Be  it 
so . What  a  noble  horse  that  is  of  yours  !  ” 

“He  has  been, — he  has  been  ;  but  worn  out  now,  like  his  master, 
and  his  master’s  fortunes.” 

“Not  so,  certainly,  the  colt  on  which  you  have  done  me  the  honor 
to  mount  me.” 

“Ah,  my  poor  boy’s  pet  I. ..  .you  are  the  first  person  who  has 
crossed  him  since - ” 

“  Is  he  of  your  own  breeding?  ”  asked  Raphael,  trying  to  turn  the 
conversation. 

“  A  cross  between  that  white  Niseean  which  you  sent  me,  and  one 
of  my  own  mares.” 

“Not  a  bad  cross  ;  though  he  keeps  a  little  of  the  bull  head  and 
grayhound  flank  of  your  Africans.” 

‘  ‘  So  much  the  better,  friend.  Give  me  bone, — ^bone  and  endurance 
for  this  rough  down  country.  Your  delicate  Nisaeans  are  all  very 
well  for  a  few  minutes  over  those  flat  sands  of  Egypt  ;  but  here  you 
need  a  horse  who  will  go  forty  miles  a  day  over  rough  and  smooth, 
and  dine  thankfully  off  thistles  at  night.  Aha,  poor  little  man  !  ” — 
as  a  jerboa  sprung  up  from  a  tuft  of  bushes  at  his  feet, — “  I  fear  you 
must  help  to  fill  our  soup-kettle  in  these  hard  times  !  ” 

And  with  a  dexterous  sweep  of  his  long  whip,  the  worthy  bishop 
entangled  the  jerboa’s  long  legs,  whisked  him  up  to  his  saddle-bow, 
and  delivered  him  to  the  groom  and  the  game-bag. 

“  Kill  him  at  once.  Don’t  let  him  squeak,  boy  ! — he  cries  too  like 
a  child.”.  . . . 

“Poor  little  wretch  !”  said  Raphael.  “What  more  right,  now, 
have  we  to  eat  him  than  he  to  eat  us  ?  ” 

“  Eh?  If  he  can  eat  us,  let  him  try.  How  long  have  you  joined 
the  Manichees  ?  ” 

“  Have  no  fears  on  that  score.  But,  as  I  told  you,  since  my  won¬ 
derful  conversion  by  Bran,  the  dog,  I  have  begun  to  hold  dumb  ani¬ 
mals  in  respect,  as  probably  quite  as  good  as  myself.” 

“  Then  you  need  a  further  conversion,  friend  Raphael,  and  to  learn 


^6  HYPATIA. 

wliat  is  the  dignity  of  man  ;  and  when  that  arrives,  you  will  learn  to 
believe,  with  me,  that  the  life  of  every  beast  upon  the  face  of  the 
earth  would  be  a  cheap  price  to  pay  in  exchange  for  the  life  of  the 
meanest  human  being.” 

“  Yes,  if  they  be  required  for  food  ;  but  really,  to  kill  them  for  our 
amusement  !  ” 

“  Friend,  when  I  was  still  a  heathen,  I  recollect  well  how  I  used  to 
haggle  at  that  story  of  the  cursing  of  the  fig-tree  ;  but  when  I  learned 
to  know  what  man  was,  and  that  I  had  been  all  my  life  mistaking 
for  a  part  of  nature  that  race  which  was  originally,  and  can  be  again, 
made  in  the  likeness  of  God,  then  I  began  to  see  that  it  were  well  ii 
every  fig-tree  upon  earth  were  cursed  if  the  spirit  of  one  man  could 
be  taught  thereby  a  single  lesson.  And  so  I  speak  of  these,  my  dar¬ 
ling  field-sports,  on  which  I  have  not  been  ashamed,  as  you  know,  to 
write  a  book.” 

“  And  a  very  charming  one  :  yet  you  were  still  a  pagan,  recollect, 
when  you  wrote  it.” 

“  I  was  ;  and  then  I  followed  the  chase  by  mere  nature  and  inclina¬ 
tion.  But  now  I  know  I  have  a  right  to  follow  it,  because  it  gives 
me  endurance,  promptness,  courage,  self-control,  as  well  as  health 
and  cheerfulness  ;  and  therefore -  Ah  !  a  fresh  ostrich-track  !  ” 

And  stopping  short,  Synesius  began  pricking  slowly  up  the  hill¬ 
side. 

“Back!”  whispered  he,  at  last.  “Quietly  and  silently.  Lie 
down  on  your  horse’s  neck,  as  I  do,  or  the  long-necked  rogues  may 
see  you.  They  must  be  close  to  us  over  the  brow.  I  know  that 
favorite  grassy  slope  of  old.  Round  under  yon  hill,  or  they  will  get 
wind  of  us,  and  then  farewell  to  them  !  ” 

And  Synesius  and  his  groom  cantered  on,  hanging  each  to  their 
horses’  necks  by  an  arm  and  a  leg,  in  a  way  which  Raphael  en¬ 
deavored  in  vain  to  imitate. 

Two  or  three  minutes  more  of  breathless  silence  brought  them  to 
the  edge  of  the  hill,  where  Synesius  halted,  peered  down  a  moment, 
and  then  turned  to  Raphael,  his  face  and  limbs  quivering  with  de¬ 
light,  as  he  held  up  two  fingers,  to  denote  the  number  of  the  birds. 

“Out  of  arrow  range  !  Slip  the  dogs,  Sypliax  !  ” 

And  in  another  minute  Raphael  found  himself  galloping  headlong 
down  the  hill,  while  two  magnificent  ostriches,  their  outspread  plumes 
waving  in  the  bright  breeze,  their  necks  stooped  almost  to  the 
ground,  and  their  long  legs  hashing  out  behind  them,  were  sweeping 
away  before  the  greyhounds  at  a  pace  which  no  mortal  horse  could 
have  held  for  ten  minutes. 

“Baby  that  I  am  still  !  ”  cried  Synesius,  tears  of  excitement  glit¬ 
tering  in  his  eyes  ;. . .  .  while,  Raphael  gave  himself  up  to  the  joy, 
and  forgot  even  Victoria,  in  the  breathless  rush  over  rock  and  bush, 
sand-hill  and  water-course. 

“  Take  care  of  that  dry  torrent-bed  1  Hold  up,  old  horse  !  This 


‘  TSE  SQUIRE-BISkoP.  g4t 

will  not  last  two  minutes  more.  Tliey  cannot  liold  tlieirpace  against 

tliis  breeze . Well  tried,  good  dog,  though  you  did  miss  him  ! 

Ah,  that  my  boy  were  here  !  There,  they  double.  Spread  right  and 
left,  my  children,  and  ride  at  them  as  they  pass  ! 

And  the  ostriches,  unable,  as  Synesius  said,  to  keep  their  pace 
against  the  breeze,  turned  sharp  on  their  pursuers,  and,  beating  the 
air  with  outspread  wings,  came  down  the  wind  again,  at  a  rate  even 
more  wonderful  than  before. 

“  Ride  at  him,  Raphael, — ride  at  him,  and  turn  him  into  those 
bushes  !  ”  cried  Synesius,  fitting  an  arrow  to  his  bow. 

Raphael  obeyed,  and  the  bird  swerved  into  the  low  scrub  ;  the  well- 
trained  horse  leaped  at  him  like  a  cat,  and  Raphael,  who  dare  not 
trust  his  skill  in  archery,  struck  with  his  whip  at  the  long  neck  as  it 
struggled  past  him,  and  felled  the  noble  quarry  to  the  ground.  He 
was  in  the  act  of  springing  down  to  secure  his  prize,  when  a  shout 
from  Synesius  stopped  him. 

‘  ‘  Are  you  mad  ?  He  will  kick  out  your  heart  !  Let  the  dogs 
hold  him  !  ” 

“  Where  is  the  other  asked  Raphael,  panting. 

“Where  he  ought  to  be.  I  have  not  missed  a  running  shot  for 
many  a  month.” 

“Really,  you  rival  the  emperor  Commodus  himself.” 

“Ah?  I  tried  his  fancy  of  crescent -headed  arrows  once,  and  de¬ 
capitated  an  ostrich  or  two  tolerably  ;  but  they  are  only  fit  for  the 
amphitheater  ;  they  will  not  lie  safely  in  the  quiver  on  horseback,  I 
find.  Blit  what  is  that?”  And  he  pointed  to  a  cloud  of  white  dust, 
about  a  mile  down  the  valley.  “  A  herd  of  antelopes.  If  so,  God  is 
indeed  gracious  to  us  !  Come  down, — whatsoever  they  are,  we  have 
no  time  to  lose.” 

And  collecting  his  scattered  forces,  Synesius  pushed  on  rapidly 
toward  the  object  which  had  attracted  his  attention. 

“(.Antelopes  !  ”  cried  one. 

“  Wild  horses  !  ”  cried  another. 

“Tame  ones,  rather  !”  cried  Synesius,  with  a  gesture  of  wrath. 

‘  ‘  I  saw  the  flash  of  arms  !  ” 

“  The  Ausurians  !”  And  a  yell  of  rage  rung  from  the  whole  troop. 

“  Will  you  follow  me,  children  ?” 

“  To  death  !  ”  shouted  they. 

“I  know  it.  O  that  I  had  seven  hundred  of  you,  as  Abraham 
had  !  We  would  see  then  whether  these  scoundrels  did  not  share, 
within  a  week,  the  fate  of  Chedorlaomer’s.” 

“Happy  man,  who  can  actually  trust  your  own  slaves!”  said 
Raphael,  as  the  party  galloped  on,  tightening  their  girdles  and  get¬ 
ting  ready  their  weapons. 

“  Slaves  ?  If  the  law  gives  me  the  power  of  selling  one  or  two  of 
them  who  are  not  yet  wise  enough  to  be  trusted  to  take  care  of 
themselves,  it  is  a  fact  which  both  I  and  they  have  long  forgotten. 


^48 


etpatia. 


Tlieir  fathers  grew  gray  at  my  father’s  table,  and  God  grant  that  they 
may  grow  gray  at  mine  !  We  eat  together,  work  together,  hunt  to¬ 
gether,  fight  together,  jest  together,  and  weep  together.  God  help 
us  all  !  for  we  nave  but  one  common  weal.  Now, — do  you  make  out 
the  enemy,  boys  ?  ” 

“  Ausurians,  your  holiness.  The  same  party  who  tried  Myrsinitis 
last  week.  I  linow  them  by  the  helmets  which  they  took  from  the 
Markmen.” 

“  And  with  whom  are  they  fighting  ?” 

No  one  could  see.  Fighting  they  certainly  were  ;  but  their  victims 
were  beyond  them,  and  the  party  galloped  on. 

‘  ‘  That  was  a  smart  business  ax  Myrsinitis.  The  Ausurians  appeared 
while  the  people  were  at  morning  prayers.  The  soldiers,  of  course, 
ran  for  their  lives,  and  hid  in  the  caverns,  leaving  the  matter  to  the 
priests.” 

“  If  they  were  of  your  presbytery,  I  doubt  not  they  proved  them¬ 
selves  worthy  of  their  diocesan.” 

‘  ‘  Ah,  if  all  my  priests  were  but  like  them  !  or  my  people  either  !  ” 
said  Synesius,  chatting  quietly  in  full  gallop,  like  a  true  son  of  the 
saddle.  ‘  ‘  They  offered  up  prayers  for  victory,  sallied  out  at  the 
head  of  the  peasants,  and  met  the  Moors  in  a  narrow  pass.  There 
their  hearts  failed  them  a  little.  Faustus,  the  deacon,  makes  them 
a  speech  ;  charges  the  leader  of  the  robbers,  like  young  David,  with 
a  stone,  beats  his  brains  out  therewith,  strips  him  in  true  Homeric 
fashion,  and  routs  the  Ausurians  with  their  leader’s  sword  ;  returns 
and  erects  a  trophy  in  due  classic  form,  and  saves  the  whole  valley.” 

“You  should  make  him  archdeacon.” 

“  I  would  send  him  and  his  townsfolk  round  the  province,  if  I 
could,  crowned  with  laurel,  and  proclaim  before  them  at  every 
market-place,  ‘These  are  men  of  God.’  With  whom  can  those 
Ausurians  be  dealing  ?  Peasants  would  have  been  all  killed  long 
ago,  and  soldiers  would  have  run  away  long  ago.  It  is  truly  a  por¬ 
tent  in  this  country  to  see  a  fight  last  ten  minutes.  Who  can  they 
be  ?  I  see  them  now,  and  hewing  away  like  men,  too.  They  are  all 
on  foot  but  two  ;  and  we  have  not  a  cohort  of  infantry  left  for  many 
a  mile  round.” 

“I  know  who  they  are  !”  cried  Eapliael,  suddenly  striking  spurs 
into  his  horse.  ‘  ‘  I  will  swear  to  that  armor  among  a  thousand.  And 
there  is  a  litter  in  the  midst  of  them.  On  I  and  fight,  men,  if  ever 
you  fought  in  your  lives  !  ” 

“Softly!”  cried  Synesius.  “Trust  an  old  soldier,  and  perhaps 

— alas  that  he  should  have  to  sav  it  ! — the  best  left  in  this  wretched 

</ 

country.  Round  by  the  hollow,  and  take  the  barbarians  suddenly 
in  fiank.  They  will  not  see  us  then  till  we  are  within  twenty 
paces  of  them.  Aha  1  you  have  a  thing  or  two  to  learn  yet,  Aben- 
Ezra.” 

A.nd  chuckling  at  the  prospect  of  action,  the  gallant  bishop  wheeled 


249 


THE  SQUIBE-BI8I10P. 

his  little  troop,  and  in  five  minutes  more  dashed  out  of  the  copse 
with  a  shout  and  a  flight  of  arrows,  and  rushed  into  the  thickest  of 
the  fight. 

One  cavalry  skirmish  must  he  very  like  another.  A  crash  of 
horses,  a  flashing  of  sword-blades,  five  minutes  of  blind  confusion, 
and  then  those  who  have  not  been  knocked  out  of  their  saddles  by 
their  neighbors’  knees,  and  have  not  cut  off  their  own  horses’  heads 
instead  of  their  enemy’s,  find  themselves,  they  know  not  how,  either 
running  away  or  being  run  away  from, — not  one  blow  in  ten  having 
taken  effect  on  either  side.  And  even  so  Eaphael,  having  made 
vain  attempts  to  cut  down  several  Moors,  found  himself  standing  on 
his  head  in  an  altogether  undignified  posture,  among  innumerable 
horses’  legs,  in  all  possible  frantic  motions.  To  avoid  one,  was  to  get 
in  the  way  of  another  ;  so  he  philosophically  sat  still,  speculating  on 
the  sensation  of  having  his  brains  kicked  out,  till  the  cloud  of  legs 
vanished,  and  he  found  himself  kneeling  abjectly  opposite  the  nose 
of  a  mule,  on  whose  back  sat,  utterly  unmoved,  a  tall  and  reverend 
man,  in  episcopal  costume.  The  stranger,  instead  of  bursting  out 
laughing,  as  Raphael  did,  solemnly  lifted  his  hand,  and  gave  him 
his  blessing.  The  Jew  sprung  to  his  feet,  heedless  of  all  such 
courtesies,  and  looking  round,  saw  the  Ausurians  galloping  off  up 
the  hill  in  scattered  groups,  and  Synesius  standing  close  by  him, 
wiping  a  bloody  sword. 

‘  ‘  Is  the  litter  safe  ?  ”  were  his  first  words. 

“  Safe  ;  and  so  are  all.  I  gave  you  up  for  killed,  when  I  saw  you 
run  through  with  that  lance.” 

“Run  through  ?  I  am  as  sound  in  the  hide  as  a  crocodile,”  said 
Raphael,  laughing. 

“Probably  the  fellow  took  the  but  instead  of  the  point,  in  his 
hurry.  So  goes  a  cavalry  scuffle.  I  saw  you  hit  three  or  four  fel¬ 
lows  running  with  the  flat  of  your  sword.” 

“Ah,  that  explains,”  said  Raphael. — “Why,  I  thought  myself 
once  the  best  swordsman  on  the  Armenian  frontier.”. . . . 

“  I  suspect  that  you  were  thinking  of  some  one  besides  the  Moors,” 
said  Synesius,  archly,  pointing  to  the  litter  ;  and  Raphael,  for  the 
first  time  for  many  a  year,  blushed  like  a  boy  of  fifteen,  and  then 
turned  haughtily  away,  and  remounted  his  horse,  saying,  “Clumsy 
fool  that  I  was  !  ” 

“  Thank  God  rather  that  you  have  been  kept  from  the  shedding  of 
blood,”  said  the  stranger  bishop,  in  a  soft,  deliberate  voice,  with  a 
peculiarly  clear  and  delicate  enunciation.  ‘  ‘  If  God  have  given  us  the 
victory,  why  grudge  His  having  spared  any  other  of  His  creatures 
bes<des  ourselves  ?  ” 

“  Because  there  are  so  many  the  more  of  them  left  to  ravish,  burn, 
and  slay,”  answered  Synesius.  “  Nevertheless,  I  am  not  going  to 
argue  with  Augustine.” 

Augustine  !  Raphael  looked  intently  at  the  man  :  a  tall,  delicate 


250 


HTPATIA. 


featured  personage,  witli  a  lofty  and  narrow  forehead,  scarred  like 
liis  cheeks  with  the  deep  furrows  of  many  a  doubt  and  woe.  Re¬ 
solve,  gentle  but  unbending,  was  expressed  in  his  thin,  close-set  lips, 
and  his  clear,  quiet  eye  :  but  the  calm  of  his  mighty  countenance 
was  the  calm  of  a  worn-out  volcano,  over  which  centuries  must  pass 
before  the  earthquake  rents  be  filled  with  kindly  soil,  and  the  cinder- 
slopes  grow  gay  with  grass  and  flowers.  The  Jew’s  thoughts,  how¬ 
ever,  were  soon  turned  into  another  channel  by  the  hearty  embraces 
of  Majoricus  and  his  son. 

“  We  have  caught  you  again,  you  truant  !  ”  said  the  young  trib¬ 
une  ;  “  you  could  not  escape  us,  you  see,  after  all.” 

‘‘  Rather,”  said  the  father,  “  we  owe  him  a  second  debt  of  grati¬ 
tude  for  a  second  deliverance.  We  were  right  hard  bested  when  you 
rode  up.” 

“  Oh,  he  brings  nothing  but  good  with  him  whenever  he  appears  ; 
and  then  he  pretends  to  be  a  bird  of  ill  omen,”  said  the  light-hearted 
tribune,  putting  his  armor  to  rights. 

Raphael  was  in  his  secret  heart  not  sorry  to  find  that  his  old 
friends  bore  him  no  grudge  for  his  caprice  :  but  all  he  answered 
was, — 

“Pray  thank  any  one  but  me  ;  I  have,  as  usual,  proved  myself  a 
fool.  But  what  brings  you  here,  like  Gods  e  Machina  ?  It  is  con¬ 
trary  to  all  probabilities.  One  would  not  admit  so  astounding  an  in¬ 
cident,  even  in  the  modern  drama.” 

‘  ‘  Contrary  to  none  whatsoever,  my  friend.  W e  found  Augustine 
at  Berenice,  in  act  to  set  off  to  Synesius  ;  we — one  of  us,  that  is — 
were  certain  that  you  would  be  found  with  him  ;  and  we  decided  on 
acting  as  Augustine’s  guard,  for  none  of  the  dastard  garrison  dare 
stir  out.” 

“One  of  us,”  thought  Raphael, — “which  one?”  And,  con¬ 
quering  his  pride,  he  asked,  as  carelessly  as  he  could,  for  Vic¬ 
toria. 

“  She  is  there,  in  the  litter,  poor  child,”  said  her  father,  in  a  seri¬ 
ous  tone. 

“  Surely  not  ill  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  Alas  !  either  the  overwrought  excitement  of  months  of  heroism 
broke  down  when  she  found  us  safe  at  last,  or  some  stroke  from 
God —  ....  "WIio  can  tell  what  I  may  not  have  deserved  ? — But  she 
has  been  utterly  prostrate  in  body  and  mind,  ever  since  we  parted 
from  you  at  Berenice.” 

The  blunt  soldier  little  guessed  the  meaning  of  his  own  words. 
But  Raphael,  as  he  heard,  felt  a  pang  shoot  through  his  heart, 
too  keen  for  him  to  discern  whether  it  sprung  from  joy  or  from  de¬ 
spair. 

“  Come,”  cried  the  cheerful  voice  of  Synesius,  “  come,  Aben-Ezra  ; 
you  have  knelt  for  Augustine’s  blessing  already,  and  now  you  must 
§nter  into  the  fruition  of  it.  Come,  you  two  philosophers  must  knew 


251 


THE  SqUIRE-BISIIOP. 

each  other.  Most  holy,  I  entreat  you  to  preach  to  this  friend  of  mine, 
at  once  the  wisest  and  the  foolishest  of  men.” 

“Only  the  latter,”  said  Raphael;  “but  open  to  any  speech  of 
Augustine’s,  at  least  when  we  are  safe  home,  and  game  enough  for 
Synesius’s  new  guests  killed.” 

And  turning  away,  he  rode  silent  and  sullen  by  the  side  of  his 
companions,  who  began  at  once  to  consult  together  as  to  the  plans  of 
Majoricus  and  his  soldiers. 

In  spite  of  himself,  Raphael  soon  became  interested  in  Augustine’s 
conversation.  He  entered  into  the  subject  of  Cyrenian  misrule  and 
ruin  as  heartily  and  shrewdly  as  any  man  of  the  world  ;  and  when  all 
the  rest  were  at  a  loss,  the  prompt  practical  hint  which  cleared  up 
the  difficulty  was  certain  to  come  from  him.  It  was  by  his  advice 
that  Majoricus  had  brought  his  soldiery  hither  ;  it  was  his  proposal 
that  they  should  be  employed-  for  a  fixed  period  in  defending  these 
remote  southern  boundaries  of  the  province  ;  he  checked  the  im¬ 
petuosity  of  Synesius,  cheered  the  despair  of  Majoricus,  appealed  to 
the  honor  and  the  Christianity  of  the  soldiers,  and  seemed  to  have  a  word 
— and  that  the  right  word — for  every  man  ;  and  after  a  while,  Aben- 
Ezra  quite  forgot  the  stiffness  and  deliberation  of  his  manner,  and  the 
quaint  use  of  Scripture-texts  in  far-fetched  illustrations  of  every 
opinion  which  he  propounded.  It  had  seemed  at  first  a  mere  affecta¬ 
tion  ;  but  the  arguments  which  it  was  employed  to  enforce  were  in 
themselves  so  moderate  and  so  rational,  that  Raphael  began  to  feel, 
little  by  little,  that  his  apparent  pendantry  was  only  the  result  of  a 
wish  to  refer  every  matter,  even  the  most  vulgar,  to  some  deep  and 
divine  rule  of  right  and  wrong. 

“But  you  forget  all  this  while,  my  friends,”  said  Majoricus  at 
last,  “  the  danger  which  you  incur  by  sheltering  proclaimed  rebels.” 

“  The  King  of  kings  has  forgiven  your  rebellion,  in  that  while  he 
has  punished  you  by  the  loss  of  your  lands  and  honors,  he  has  given 
you  your  life  for  a  prey  in  this  city  of  refuge.  It  remains  for  you  to 
bring  forth  worthy  fruits  of  penitence  ;  of  which  I  know  none  better 
than  those  which  John  the  Baptist  commanded  to  the  soldiery  of  old, 

‘  Do  no  violence  to  any  man,  and  be  content  with  your  wages.’  ” 

“As  for  rebels  and  rebellion,”  said  Synesius,  “  they  are  matters 
unknown  among  us  ;  for  where  there  is  no  king  there  can  be  no  rebel¬ 
lion.  Whosoevor  will  help  us  against  Ausurians  is  loyal  in  our  eyeSo 
And  as  for  our  political  creed,  it  is  simple  enough, — namely,  that  the 
emperor  never  dies,  and  that  his  name  is  Agamemnon,  who  fought  at 
Troy  ;  which  any  of  my  grooms  will  prove  to  you  syllogisticaUy 
enough  to  satisfy  Augustine  himself.  As  thus, — 

“  Agamemnon  was  the  greatest  and  the  best  of  kings. 

“  The  emperor  is  the  greatest  and  best  of  kings. 

“  Therefore,  Agamemnon  is  the  emperor,  and  conversely.” 

“It  had  been  well,”  said  Augustine,  with  a  grave  smile,  “if  some 
of  our  friends  had  held  the  same  doctrine^  even  at  the  expense  of 
their  logic,” 


252 


HYPATIA. 


“  Or  if,”  answered  Synesius,  “  they  believed  with  us,  that  the  em¬ 
peror’s  chamberlain  is  a  clever  old  man,  with  a  bald  head  like  my 
own,  Ulysses  by  name,  who  was  rewarded  with  the  prefecture  of  all 
lands  north  of  the  Mediterranean,  for  putting  out  the  Cyclop’s  eye  two 
years  ago.  However,  enough  of  this.  But,  you  see,  you  are  not  in 
any  extreme  danger  of  informers  and  intriguers . The  real  diffi¬ 

culty  is  how  you  will  be  able  to  obey  Augustine,  by  being  content 
with  your  wages.  For,”  lowering  his  voice,  “you  will  get  literally 
none.” 

“It  will  be  as  much  as  we  deserve,”  said  the  young  tribune  ;  “but 
my  fellows  have  a  trick  of  eating - ” 

“  They  are  welcome,  then,  to  all  deer  and  ostriches  which  they  can 
catch.  But  I  am  not  only  penniless,  but  reduced  myself  to  live  like 
the  Lsestrygons  on  meat  and  nothing  else  ;  all  crops  and  stocks  for 
miles  round  being  either  burned  or  carried  off.” 

“  E  nihilo  nihil !  ”  said  Augustine,  having  nothing  else  to  say.  But 
here  Raphael  woke  up  on  a  sudden  with — 

“  Did  the  Pentapolitan  wheat-ships  go  to  Rome?’* 

“No;  Orestes  stopped  them  when  he  stopped  the  Alexandrian 
convoy.” 

“  Then  the  Jews  have  the  wheat,  trust  them  for  it  ;  and  what  they 
have,  I  have.  There  are  certain  moneys  of  mine  lying  at  interest  in 
the  seaports,  which  will  set  that  matter  to  rights  for  a  month  or  two. 
Do  you  find  an  escort  to-morrow,  and  I  will  find  wheat.” 

“But,  most  generous  of  friends,  I  can  neither  repay  you  interest 
nor  principal.’' 

“Be  it  so.  I  have  spent  so  much  money  during  the  last  thirty 
years  in  doing  nothing  but  evil,  that  it  is  hard  if  I  may  not  at  last 
spend  a  little  in  doing  good.  Unless  his  holiness  of  Hippo  thinks  it 
wrong  for  you  to  accept  the  good-will  of  an  infidel  ?” 

“  Which  of  these  three,”  said  Augustine,  “was  neighbor  to  him 
who  fell  among  thieves,  but  he  who  had  mercy  on  him?  Verily,  my 
friend  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  thou  art  not  far  from  the  kingdom  of 
God.” 

“  Of  which  god  ?”  asked  Raphael,  slyly. 

“  Of  the  God  of  thy  forefather  Abraham,  whom  thou  shalt  hear  us 
worship  this  evening,  if  He  will.  Synesius,  have  you  a  church 
wherein  I  can  perform  the  evening  service,  and  give  a  word  of  exhor¬ 
tation  to  these  my  children  ?  ” 

Synesius  sighed.  “  There  is  a  ruin,  which  was  last  month  a 
church.” 

‘  ‘  And  is  one  still.  Man  did  not  place  there  the  presence  of  God, 
and  man  cannot  expel  it.” 

And  so,  sending  out  hunting  parties  right  and  left  in  chase  of  every¬ 
thing  which  had  animal  life,  and  picking  up  before  nightfall  a  toler 
ably  abundant  supply  of  game,  they  went  homeward,  where  Victoria 
wa§  intrusted  to  the  care  of  Synesius’s  old  stewardess,  and  the  soj- 


THE  SQUIRE-BISHOP. 


253 


diery  were  marched  straight  into  the  church  ;  while  Synesius’s  ser¬ 
vants,  to  whom  the  Latin  service  would  have  been  unintelligible, 
busied  themselves  in  cooking  the  still  warm  game. 

Strangely  enough  it  sounded  to  Eaphael  that  evening,  to  hear 
among  those  smoke-grimed  pillars  and  fallen  rafters  the  grand  old 
Hebrew  psalms  of  his  nation  ring  aloft,  to  the  very  chants,  too,  which 
were  said  by  the  rabbi  to  have  been  used  in  the  Temple- worship  of 

Jerusalem . They,  and  the  invocation,  thanksgivings,  blessings, 

the  very  outward  ceremonial  itself,  were  all  Hebraic,  redolent  of  the 
thougnts,  the  words  of  his  own  ancestors.  That  lesson  from  the  book 
of  Proverbs,  which  Augustine’s  deacon  was  reading  in  Latin, — the 
blood  of  the  man  who  wrote  those  words  was  flowing  in  Aben-Ezra’s 
veins . Was  it  a  mistake,  an  hypocrisy?  or  were  they  indeed  wor¬ 

shiping,  as  they  fancied,  the  Ancient  One  who  spoke  face  to  face  with 
his  forefathers,  the  Archetype  of  man,  the  Friend  of  Abraham  and 
of  Israel? 

And  now  the  sermon  began  ;  and  as  Augustine  stood  for  a  moment 
in  prayer  in  front  of  a  ruined  altar,  every  furrow  in  his  worn  face  lit 
up  by  a  ray  of  moonlight  which  streamed  in  through  the  broken  roof, 
Raphael  waited  impatiently  for  his  speech.  What  would  ho,  the  re¬ 
fined  dialectician,  the  ancient  teacher  of  heathen  rhetoric,  the  courtly 
and  learned  student,  the  ascetic  celibate  and  theosopher,  have  to  say 
to  those  coarse,  war-worn  soldiers,  Thracians  and  Markmen,  Gauls 
and  Belgians,  who  sat  watching  there,  with  those  sad,  earnest  faces? 
What  one  thought  or  feeling  in  common  could  there  be  between 
Augustine  and  his  congregation  ? 

At  last,  after  signing  himself  with  the  cross,  he  began.  The  sub¬ 
ject  was  one  of  the  psalms  which  had  just  been  read, — a  battle  psalm, 
concerning  Moab  and  Amalek,  and  the  old  border  wars  of  Palestine. 
What  would  he  make  of  that  ? 

He  seemed  to  start  lamely  enough,  in  spite  of  the  exquisite  grace 
of  his  voice,  and  manner,  and  language,  and  the  epigrammatic  terse¬ 
ness  of  every  sentence.  He  spent  some  minutes  over  the  inscription 
of  the  psalm, — allegorized  it, — made  it  mean  something  which  it 
never  did  mean  in  the  writer’s  mind,  and  which  it,  as  Raphael  well 
knew,  never  could  mean,  for  his  interpretation  was  founded  on  a 
sheer  mistranslation.  He  punned  on  the  Latin  version, — derived 

the  meaning  of  Hebrew  words  from  Latin  etymologies . And  as  he 

went  on  with  the  psalm  itself,  the  common  sense  of  David  seemed  to 
evaporate  in  mysticism.  The  most  fantastic  and  far-fetched  illustra¬ 
tions,  drawn  from  the  commonest  objects,  alternated  with  mysterious. 
theosophic  dogma.  Where  was  that  learning  for  which  he  was  so 
famed  ?  Where  was  that  reverence  for  the  old  Hebrew  Scriptures 
which  he  professed  ?  He  was  treating  David  as  ill  as  Hypatia  used  to 
treat  Homer, — worse  even  than  old  Philo  did,  when  in  the  home  life  of 
the  old  patriarchs,  and  in  the  mighty  acts  of  Moses  and  Joshua,  he 
could  find  nothing  but  spiritual  allegories  wherewith  to  pamper  the 


254 


HYPATIA. 


private  experiences  of  tlie  secluded  tlieosopliist.  And  Eapliael  felt 
very  mucli  inclined  to  get  up  and  go  away,  and  still  more  inclined  to 
say,  with  a  smile,  in  liis  haste,  ‘  ‘  All  men  are  liars.  ” 

And  yet,  what  an  illustration  that  last  one  was  !  No  mere  fancy, 
but  a  real  deep  glance  into  the  working  of  the  material  universe,  as 
symbolic  of  the  spiritual  and  unseen  one.  And  not  drawn,  as  Hypa¬ 
tia’s  were,  exclusively  from  some  sublime  or  portentous  phenomenon, 
but  from  some  dog,  or  kettle,  or  fish-wife,  with  a  homely  insight 
worthy  of  old  Socrates  himself.  Hot^  personal  he  was  becoming, 
too  !.  . .  .  No  long  bursts  of  declamation,  but  dramatic  dialogue  and 
interrogation,  by-hints,  and  unexpected  hits  at  one  and  the  other 

most  commonplace  soldier’s  failing . And  yet  each  pithy  rebuke 

was  put  in  a  universal,  comprehensive  form,  which  made  Kaphael 
himself  wince, — which  might,  he  thought,  have  made  any  man,  or 
woman  either,  wince  in  like  manner.  Well,  whether  or  not  Augus¬ 
tine  knew  truths  for  all  men,  he  at  least  knew  sins  for  all  men,  and 
for  himself  as  well  as  his  hearers.  There  was  no  denying  that.  He 
was  a  real  man,  right  or  wrong.  What  he  rebuked  in  others,  he  had 
felt  in  himself,  and  fought  it  to  the  death-grip,  as  the  fiash  and 
quiver  of  that  worn  face  proclaimed . But  yet  why  were  the  Edo¬ 

mites,  by  an  utterly  mistaken  pun  on  their  name,  to  signify  one  sort 
of  sin,  and  the  Ammonites  another,  and  the  Amalekites  another? 
What  had  that  to  do  with  the  old  psalm  ?  What  had  it  to  do  with 
the  present  auditory  ?  Was  not  this  the  wildest  and  lowest  form  of 
that  unreal,  subtilizing  mystic  pedantry,  of  which  he  had  sickened 
long  ago  in  Hypatia’s  lecture- room,  till  he  fled  to  Bran,  the  dog,  for 
honest  practical  realities  ? 

No . Gradually,  as  Augustine’s  hints  became  more  practical  and 

pointed,  Eaphael  saw  that  there  was  in  his  mind  a  most  real  and 
organic  connection,  true  or  false,  in  what  seemed  at  first  mere  arbi¬ 
trary  allegory.  Amalekites,  personal  sins,  Ausurian  robbers,  and 
ravishers,  were  to  him  only  so  many  difierent  forms  of  one  and  the 
same  evil.  He  who  helped  any  of  them,  fought  against  the  right¬ 
eous  God  ;  he  who  fought  against  them  fought  for  that  God  ;  but  he 
must  conquer  the  Amalekites  within,  if  he  expected  to  conquer  the 
Amalekites  without.  Could  the  legionaries  permanently  put  down 
the  lust  and  greed  around  them,  while  their  own  hearts  were  enslaved 
to  lust  and  greed  within?  Would  they  not  be  helping  it  by  ex¬ 
ample,  while  they  pretended  to  crush  it  by  sword-strokes  ?  Was  it 
not  a  mockery,  an  hypocrisy?  Could  God’s  blessing  be  on  it? 
Could  they  restore  unity  and  peace  to  the  country  while  there  was 
neither  unity  nor  peace  within  them?  What  had  produced  the 
helplessness  of  the  people,  the  imbecility  of  the  military,  but 
inward  helplessness  ?  They  were  weak  against  Moors,  because 
they  were  weak  against  enemies  more  deadly  than  Moors,  How 
could  they  fight  for  God  outwardly,  while  they  were  fighting  against 
Him  inwardly?  He  would  not  go  forth  with  their  hosts.  How  could 


THE  SqUIRE-BISnOP. 


255 


fle,  when  H(3  was  not  among  their  hosts  ?  He,  a  spirit,  must  dwell 

in  their  spirits . And  then  the  shout  of  a  King  would  be  among 

them,  and  one  of  them  should  chase  a  thousand . Or  if  not, — if 

both  people  and  soldiers  required  still  further  chastening  and  hum¬ 
bling, — what  matter,  provided  they  were  chastened  and  humbled  ? 
What  matter  if  their  faces  were  confounded,  if  they  were  thereby 
driven  to  seek  His  name,  who  alone  was  the  Truth,  the  Light,  and 
the  Life?  What  if  they  were  slain?  Let  them  have  conquered  the 
inward  enemies,  what  matter  to.  them  if  tlie  outward  enemies  seemed 
to  prevail  for  a  moment  ?  They  should  be  recompensed  at  the  resur¬ 
rection  of  the  just,  when  death  was  swallowed  up  in  victory.  It 
would  be  seen  then  who  had  really  conquered  in  the  ej^es  of  the  just 
God — they,  God’s  ministers,  the  defenders  of  peace  and  justice,  or  the 

Ausurians,  the  enemies  thereof . And  then,  by  some  quaintest  turn 

of  fancy,  he  introduced  a  word  of  pity  and  hope,  even  for  the  wild 
Moorish  robbers.  It  might  be  good  for  them  to  have  succeeded  thus 
far  ;  they  might  learn  from  their  Christian  captives,  purified  by  afflic¬ 
tion,  truths  which  those  captives  had  forgotten  in  prosperity.  And, 
again,  it  might  be  good  for  them,  as  well  as  for  Christians,  to  be  con¬ 
founded  and  made  like  chaff  before  the  wind,  that  so  they,  too  might 

learn  His  name . And  so  on,  through  and  in  spite  of  all  conceits, 

allegories,  overstrained  interpretations,  Augustine  went  on  evolving 
from  the  Psalms,  and  from  the  past,  and  from  the  future,  the  asser¬ 
tion  of  a  Living,  Present  God,  the  eternal  enemy  of  discord,  injustice, 
and  evil,  the  eternal  helper  and  deliverer  of  those  who  were  enslaved 

and  crushed  thereby  in  soul  or  body . It  was  all  most  strange  to 

Eaphael . Strange  in  its  utter  unlikeliness  to  any  teaching,  Pla- 

tonist  or  Hebrew,  which  he  had  ever  heard  before,  and  stranger  still 
in  its  agreement  with  those  teachings  ;  in  the  instinctive  ease  with 
which  it  seemed  to  unite  and  justify  them  all  by  the  talisman  of  some 
one  idea, — and  what  that  might  be,  his  Jewish  prejudices  could  not 
prevent  his  seeing,  and  yet  would  not  allow  him  to  acknowledge. 
But,  howsoever  he  might  redden  with  Hebrew  pride, — howsoever  he 
might  long  to  persuade  himself  that  Augustine  was  building  up  a 
sound  and  right  practical  structure  on  the  foundation  of  a  sheer  lie, 
--he  could  not  help  watching,  at  first  with  envy,  and  then  with 
bonest  pleasure,  the  faces  of  the  rough  soldiers,  as  they  gradually 
lightened  up  into  fixed  attention,  into  cheerful  and  solemn  resolve. 

“What  wonder?”  said  Raphael  to  himself,  “  what  wonder,  after 
all  ?  He  has  been  speaking  to  these  wild  beasts  as  to  sages  and  saints  ; 
he  has  been  telling  them  that  God  is  as  much  with  them  as  with 

prophets  and  psalmists . I  wonder  if  Hypatia,  with  all  her  beauty, 

could  have  touched  their  hearts  as  he  has  done  ?  ” 

And  when  Rapbadl  rose  at  the  end  of  this  strange  discourse,  he  felt 
more  like  an  old  Hebrew  than  he  had  done  since  he  sat  upon  his 
nurse’s  knee,  and  heard  legends  about  Solomon  and  the  Queen  of 
Sheba.  What  if  Augustine  were  right  after  all  ?  What  if  the 


HYPATIA 


Jeliovali  of  the  old  Scriptures  were  not  merely  the  national  patron  of 
the  children  of  Abraham,  as  the  rabbis  held  ;  not  merely,  as  Philo 
held,  the  Divine  Wisdom  which  inspired  a  few  elect  sages,  even 
among  the  heathen ;  but  the  Lord  of  the  whole  earth,  and  of  the 
nations  thereof  ? — And  suddenly,  for  the  first  time  in  his  life,  passages 
from  the  psalms  and  prophets  fiashed  across  him,  which  seemed  to 
assert  this.  What  else  did  that  whole  book  of  Daniel,  and  the  history 
of  Nebuchadnezzar  mean — if  not  that  ?  Philosophic  latitudina- 
rianism  had  long  ago  cured  him  of  the  rabbinical  notion  of  the 
Babylonian  conqueror  as  an  incarnate  fiend,  devoted  to  Tophet,  like 
Sennacherib  before  him.  He  had  long  in  private  admired  the  man, 
as  a  magnificent  human  character,  a  fairer  one,  in  his  eyes,  than 

either  Alexander  or  Julius  Caesar . What  if  Augustine  had  given 

him  a  hint  which  might  justify  his  admiration  !. . .  .But  more. _ 

What  if  Augustine  wore  right  in  going  even  further  than  Philo  and 
Hypatia  ?  What  if  this  same  Jehovah,  Wisdom,  Logos,  call  him 
what  they  might,  were  actually  the  God  of  the  spirits,  as  well  as  of 
the  bodies,  of  all  flesh  ?  What  if  he  were  as  near — Augustine  said 
that  he  was — to  the  hearts  of  those  wild  Markmen,  Gauls,  Thracians, 
as  to  Augustine’s  own  heart  ?  What  if  he  were — Augustine  said  he 
was' — yearning  after,  enlightening,  leading  home  to  himself,  the  souls 
of  the  poorest,  the  most  brutal,  the  most  sinful? — What  if  he  loved 
man  as  man,  and  not  merely  one  favored  race  or  one  favored  class  of 
minds  ?  , ,  .And  in  the  light  of  that  hypothesis,  that  strange  story  of 

the  Cross  of  Calvary  seemed  not  so  impossible,  after  all . But  then, 

celibacy  and  asceticism,  utterly  non-human  as  they  were,  what  had 
they  to  do  with  the  theory  of  a  human  God  ? 

And,  filled  with  many  questionings,  Raphael  was  not  sorry  to  have 
the  matter  brought  to  an  issue  that  very  evening,  in  Synesius’s  sit¬ 
ting-room.  Majoricus,  in  his  blunt,  soldier-like  way,  set  Raphael 
and  Augustine  at  each  other  without  circumlocution  ;  and  Raphael, 
after  trying  to  smile  and  pooh-pooh  away  the  subject,  was  tempted 
to  make  a  jest  on  a  seeming  fallacious  conceit  of  Augustine’s,' — found 
it  more  difficult  than  he  thought  to  trip  up  the  serious  and  wary 
logician,  lost  his  temper  a  little, — a  sign,  perhaps,  of  returning 
health  in  a  skeptic, — and  soon  found  himself  fighting  desperately, 
with  Synesius  backing  him,  apparently  for  the  mere  pleasure  of  see¬ 
ing  a  battle,  and  Majoricus  making  him  more  and  more  cross  by  the 
implicit  dogmatic  faith  with  which  he  hewed  at  one  Gordian  knot 
after  another,  till  Augustine  had  to  save  himself  from  his  friends  by 
tripping  the  good  prefect  gently  up,  and  leaving  him  miles  behind 
the  disputants,  who  argued  on  and  on,  till  broad  daylight  shone  in, 
and  the  sight  of  the  desolation  below  recalled  all  parties  to  more 
material  weapons,  and  a  sterner  warfare. 

But  little  thought  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  as  he  sat  there,  calling  up 
every  resource  of  his  wit  and  learning,  in  the  hope,  half  malicious, 
half  honestly  cautious,  of  upsetting  the  sage  of  Hippo,  and  forget- 


S57 


TMB  SqxrniE-BTSEOP. 

ting  all  heaven  and  earth  in  the  delight  of  battle  withliis  peers,  that 
in  a  neighboring  chamber,  her  tender  limbs  outspread  upon  the  floor, 
her  face  buried  in  her  dishevelled  locks,  lay  Victoria,  wrestling  all 
night  long  for  him  in  prayer  and  bitter  tears,  as  the  murmur  of  busy 
voices  reached  her  eager  ears,  longing  in  vain  to  catch  the  sense  of 
words,  on  which  hung  now  her  hopes  and  bliss, — bow  utterly  and 
entirely,  she  had  never  yet  confessed  to  herself,  though  she  dare 
confess  it  to  that  Son  of  Man  to  whom  she  prayed,  as  to  One  who 
felt  with  tenderness  and  insight  beyond  that  of  a  brother,  a  father, 
sven  of  a  moth  fox  her  maiden’s  blushes  and  her  maiden’s  woes. 


CHAPTER  XXH. 


PANDEMONIUM. 

But  wliere  was  Pliilammon  all  that  week  ? 

For  the  first  Jay  or  two  of  his  imprisonment  he  had  raved  like 
some  wild  beast  entrapped.  His  newly-found  purpose  and  energy, 
thus  suddenly  dammed  back  and  checked,  boiled  up  in  frantic  rage. 
He  tore  at  the  bars  of  his  prison  ;  he  rolled  himself,  shrieking,  on 
the  floor.  He  called  in  vain  on  Hypatia,  on  Pelagia,  on  Arsenins,  on 
all  but  God.  Pray  he  could  not,  and  dare  not  ;  for  to  whom  was  he 
to  pray  ?  To  the  stars  ? — to  the  Abysses  and  the  Eternities  ?. . . . 

Alas  !  as  Augustine  said  once,  bitterly  enough,  of  his  own  Mani- 
chaean  teachers,  Hypatia  had  taken  away  the  living  God,  and  given 

him  instead  the  four  Elements . And  in  utter  bewilderment  and 

hopeless  terror  he  implored  the  pity  of  every  guard  and  jailer  who 
passed  along  the  corridor,  and  conjured  them,  as  brothers,  fathers, 
men,  to  help  him.  Moved  at  once  by  his  agony  and  by  his  exceeding 
beauty,  the  rough  Thracians,  who  knew  enough  of  their  employer’s 
character  to  have  little  difficulty  in  believing  his  victim  to  be  inno¬ 
cent,  listened  to  him  and  questioned  him.  But  when  they  offered 
the  very  help  which  he  implored,  and  asked  him  to  tell  his  story,  the 
poor  boy’s  tongue  clave  to  the  roof  of  his  mouth.  How  could  he 
publish  his  sister’s  shame?  And  yet  she  was  about  to  publish  it  her¬ 
self  !.  . .  .And  instead  of  words,  he  met  their  condolences  with  fresh 
agonies,  till  they  gave  him  np  as  mad  ;  and,  tired  by  his  violence, 
compelled  him,  with  blows  and  curses,  to  remain  quiet  :  and  so  the 
week  wore  out,  in  dull  and  stupefied  despair,  which  trembled  on  the 
very  edge  of  idiocy.  Night  and  day  were  alike  to  him.  The  food 
which  was  thrust  in  through  his  grate  remained  untasted  ;  hour 
after  hour,  day  after  day,  he  sat  upon  the  ground,  his  head  buried  in 
his  hands,  half  dozing  from  mere  exhaustion  of  body  and  mind. 
Why  should  he  care  to  stir,  to  eat,  to  live  ?  He  had  but  one  purpose 
in  heaven  and  earth  ;  and  that  one  purpose  was  impossible. 

At  last  his  cell-door  grated  on  its  hinges.  “  Up,  my  mad  youth  !” 
cried  a  rough  voice.  “  Up,  and  thank  the  favor  of  the  gods,  and  the 
bounty  of  our  noble — ahem! — prefect.  To-day  he  gives  freedom  to 
all  prisoners.  And  I  suppose  a  pretty  boy  like  you  may  go  about 
your  business,  as  well  as  uglier  rascals  !  ” 

Pliilammon  looked  up  in  the  jailer’s  face  with  a  dim  half-com¬ 
prehension  of  his  meaning. 

(358) 


Pandemonium. 


youliear?”  cried  tlie  man,  witli  a  curse,  ‘‘You  are  free. 
Jump  up,  or  I  shut  the  door  again,  and  your  one  chance  is  over.’’ 

“  Did  she  dance  Venus  Anadyomene  ?  ” 

“She!  Who?” 

“  My  sister  !  Pelagia  !  ” 

“  Heaven  only  knows  what  she  has  not  danced  in  her  time  1  But 
they  say  she  dances  to-day  once  more.  Quick  !  out,  or  I  shall  not  be 
ready  in  time  for  the  sports.  They  begin  an  hour  hence.  Free 
admission  into  the  theater  to-day  for  all, — rogues  and  honest  men, 
Christians  and  heathens. — Curse  the  boy  I  he’s  as  mad  as  ever.” 

•  So  indeed  Philaniinon  seemed  ;  for,  springing  suddenly  to  his  feet, 
he  rushed  out  past  the  jailer,  upsetting  him  into  the  corridor,  and 
fled  wildly  from  the  prison  among  the  crowd  of  liberated  ruffians,  ran 
from  the  prison  home,  from  home  to  the  baths,  from  the  baths  to  the 
theater,  and  was  soon  pushing  his  way,  regardless  of  etiquette,  toward 
the  lower  tiers  of  benches,  in  order,  he  hardly  knew  why,  to  place 
himself  as  near  as  possible  to  the  very  sight  which  he  dreaded  and 
abhorred. 

/  As  fate  would  have  it,  the  passage  by  which  he  had  entered  opened 
}  close  to  the  prefect’s  chair  of  state,  where  sat  Orestes,  gorgeous  in 
his  robes  of  office,  and  by  him — to  Phil  amnion’s  surprise  and  horror — 
Hypatia  herself. 

More  beautiful  than  ever,  her  forehead  sparkling,  like  Juno’s  own, 
with  a  lofty  tiara  of  jewels,  her  white  Ionic  robe  half  hidden  by  a 
crimson  shawl,  there  sat  the  vestal,  the  philosopher.  What  did  she 
there  ?  But  the  boy’s  eager  eyes,  accustomed  but  too  well  to  note 
every  light  and  shade  of  feeling  wdiich  crossed  that  face,  saw  in  a 
moment  how  wan  and  haggard  was  its  expression.  She  wore  a  look 
of  constraint,  of  half -terrified  self- resolve,  as  of  a  martyr  :  and.  yet 
not  an  undoubting  martyr  ;  for  as  Orestes  turned  his  head  at  the  stir 
of  Philammon’s  intrusion,  and,  flashing  with  anger  at  the  sight, 
motioned  him  fiercely  back,  Hypatia  turned  too  ;  and,  as  her  eyes 
met  her  pupil’s,  slie  blushed  crimson,  and  started,  and  seemed  in  act 
to  motion  him  back  also  ;  and  then,  recollecting  herself,  whispered 
something  to  Orestes  which  quieted  his  wrath,  and  composed  herself, 
or  rather  sunk  into  her  place  again,  as  one  who  was  determined  to 
abide  the  worst. 

A  knot  of  gay  young  gentlemen,  Philammon’s  fellow-students, 
pulled  him  down  among  them,  with  welcome  and  laughter  ;  and 
before  he  could  collect  his  thoughts,  the  curtain  in  front  of  the  stage 
had  fallen,  and  the  sport  began. 

The  scene  represented  a  background  of  desert  mountains,  and  on 
the  stage  itself,  before  a  group  of  temporary  huts,  stood  huddling 
together  the  black  Libyan  prisoners,  some  fifty  men,  women,  and 
children,  bedizened  with  gaudy  feathers  and  girdles  of  tasseled 
leather,  brandishing  their  spears  and  targets,  and  glaring  out  with 
-  white  eyes  on  the  strange  scene  before  them,  in  childish  awe  and 
wonder. 


m 


MrpAfiA. 


Along  the  front  of  the  stage  a  wattled  battlement  had  been  erected, 
while  below,  the  hyposcenium  had  been  painted  to  represent  rocks, 
thus  completing  the  rough  imitation  of  a  village  among  the  Libyan 
hills. 

Amid  breathless  silence,  a  herald  advanced,  and  proclaimed  that 
these  were  prisoners  taken  in  arms  against  the  Roman  senate  and 
people,  and  therefore  worthy  of  immediate  death  ;  but  that  the 
prefect,  in  his  exceeding  clemency  toward  them,  and  especial  anxiety 
to  afEord  the  greatest  possible  amusement  to  the  obedient  and  loyal 
citizens  of  Alexandria,  had  determined,  instead  of  giving  them  at  one© 
to  the  beasts,  to  allow  them  to  fight  for  their  lives,  promising  to  the 
survivors  a  free  pardon  if  they  acquitted  themselves  valiantly. 

The  poor  wretches  on  the  stage,  when  this  proclamation  was  trans¬ 
lated  to  them,  set  up  a  barbaric  yell  of  joy,  and  brandished  their 
spears  and  targets  more  fiercely  than  ever. 

But  their  joy  was  short.  The  trumpet  sounded  the  attack  ;  a  body 
of  gladiators,  equal  in  number  to  the  savages,  marched  out  from  one 
of  the  two  side  passages,  made  their  obeisance  to  the  applauding  spec¬ 
tators,  and,  planting  their  scaling-ladders  against  the  front  of  the 
stage,  mounted  to  the  attack. 

The  Libyans  fought  like  tigers  ;  yet  from  the  first  Hypatia,  and 
Philammon  also,  could  see  that  their  promised  chance  of  life  was  a 
mere  mockery.  Their  light  darts  and  naked  limbs  were  no  match  for 
the  heavy  swords  and  complete  armor  of  their  brutal  assailants,  who 
endured  carelessly  a  storm  of  blows  and  thrusts  on  heads  and  faces 
protected  by  visored  helmets  ;  jLt  so  fierce  was  the  valor  of  the  Lib¬ 
yans,  that  even  they  recoiled  twice,  and  twice  the  scaling-ladders  were 
hurled  down  again,  while  more  than  one  gladiator  lay  below,  rolling 
in  the  death-agony. 

And  then  burst  forth  the  sleeping  devil  in  the  hearts  of  that  great 
brutalized  multitude.  Yell  upon  yell  of  savage  triumph,  and  still 
more  savage  disappointment,  rung  from  every  tier  of  that  vast  ring 
of  seats,  at  each  blow  and  parry,  onslaught  and  repulse  ;  and  Philam¬ 
mon  saw  with  horror  and  surprise  that  luxury,  refinement,  philo¬ 
sophic  culture  itself,  were  no  safeguards  against  the  infection  of  blood¬ 
thirstiness.  Gay  and  delicate  ladies,  whom  he  had  seen  three  days 
before  simpering  delight  at  Hypatia’s  heavenward  aspirations,  and 
some,  too,  whom  he  seemed  to  recollect  in  Christian  churches,  sprung 
from  their  seats,  waved  their  hands  and  handkerchiefs,  and  clapped 
anH  shouted  to  the  gladiators.  For,  alas  !  there  was  no  doubt  as  to 
which  side  the  favor  of  the  spectators  inclined.  With  taunts,  jeers, 
applause,  entreaties,  the  hired  ruffians  were  urged  on  to  their  work  of 
blood.  The  poor  wretches  heard  no  voice  raised  in  their  favor  ;  noth¬ 
ing  but  contempt,  hatred,  eager  lust  of  blood,  glared  from  those 
thousands  of  pitiless  eyes  ;  and,  broken-hearted,  despairing,  they 
fiagged  and  drew  back  one  by  one.  A  shout  of  triumph  greeted  the 
gladiators  as  they  climbed  over  the  battlemept,  and  gained  a  footing 


PAlaiDEMomtlM.  ^6l 

on  the  stage,  The  wretched  blacks  broke  up,  and  fled  wildly  from 
corner  to  corner,  loo]?;ing  vainly  for  an  outlet . 

And  then  began  a  butchery . Some  fifty  men,  women,  and  chil¬ 
dren  were  cooped  together  in  that  narrow  space . And  yet  Hy¬ 

patia’s  countenance  did  not  falter.  Why  should  it  ?  What  were 
their  numbers,  beside  the  thousands  who  had  perished  year  by 
year  for  centuries,  by  that  and  far  worse  deaths,  in  the  amphi¬ 
theaters  of  that  empire,  for  that  faith  which  she  was  vowed  to  re¬ 
establish.  It  was  a  part  of  the  great  system,  and  she  must  endure 
it. 

Not  that  she  did  not  feel  :  for  she,  too,  was  woman  ;  and  her 
heart,  raised  far  above  the  brutal  excitement  of  the  multitude,  lay 
calmly  open  to  the  most  poignant  stings  of  pity.  Again  and  again 
she  was  in  the  act  to  entreat  mercy  for  some  shrieking  woman  or 
struggling  child  ;  but  before  her  lips  could  shape  the  words,  the  blow 
had  fallen,  or  ttie  wretch  was  whirled  away  from  her  sight  in  the 
dense,  undistinguishable  mass  of  slayers  and  slain.  Yea,  she  had  be¬ 
gun,  and  she  must  follow  to  the  end,. . .  .And,  after  all,  what  were 
the  lives  of  these  few  semi-brutes,  returning  thus  a  few  years  earlier 
to  the  clay  from  which  they  sprung,  compared  with  the  regeneration 
of  a  world  ?.  . .  .And  it  would  be  over  in  a  few  minutes  more,  and  that 

black,  writhing  heap  be  still  forever,  and  the  curtain  fall . And 

then  for  Venus  Anadyomene,  and  art,  and  joy,  and  peace,  and  the 
graceful  wisdom  and  beauty  of  the  old  Greek  art,  calming  and  civil¬ 
izing  all  hearts,  and  softening  them  into  pure  devotion  for  the  im¬ 
mortal  myths,  the  immortal  deities,  who  had  inspired  their  forefathers 

in  the  glorious  days  of  old . But  still  the  black  heap  writhed  ;  and 

she  looked  away,  up,  down,  and  round,  everywhere,  to  avoid  the 
sickening  sight  ;  and  yet  her  eye  caught  Philammon’s  gazing  at  her 

with  looks  of  horror  and  disgust . A  thrill  of  shame  rushed 

through  her  heart,  and,  blushing  scarlet,  she  sunk  her  head,  and 
whispered  to  Orestes, — 

“  Have  mercy  ! — spare  the  rest  !” 

“Nay,  fairest  vestal  !  The  mob  has  tasted  blood,  and  they  must 
have  their  fill  of  it,  o-r  they  will  turn  on  us,  for  aught  I  know.  Noth¬ 
ing  so  dangerous  as  to  check  a  brute,  whether  he  be  horse,  dog,  or 
man,  when  once  his  spirit  is  up.  Ha  !  there  is  a  fugitive  !  How  well 
the  little  rascal  runs  !  ” 

As  he  spoke,  a  boy,  the  only  survivor,  leaped  from  the  stage,  and 
rushed  across  the  orchestra  toward  them,  followed  by  a  rough  cur- 
dog. 

“You  shall  have  this  youth  if  he  reaches  us.” 

Hypatia  watched  breathless.  The  boy  had  just  arrived  at  the  altar 
in  the  center  of  the  orchestra,  when  he  saw  a  gladiator  close  upon 
him.  The  rutfian’s  arm  was  raised  to  strike,  when,  to  the  astonish¬ 
ment  of  the  whole  theater,  boy  and  dog  turned  valiantly  to  bay,  and, 
leaping  on  the  gladiator,  dragged  him  between  them  to  the  ground 


HTPATIA. 


§6^ 

The  triumph  was  momentarj.  The  uplifted  hands,  the  shout  of 
“  Spare  him  1  came  too  late.  The  man,  as  he  lay,  buried  his  sword 
in  the  slender  body  of  the  child,  and  then,  rising,  walked  coolly  back 
to  the  side  passages,  while  the  poor  cur  stood  over  the  little  corpse, 
licking  its  hands  and  face,  and  making  the  whole  building  ring  with 
his  doleful  cries.  The  attendants  entered,  and,  striking  their  hooks 
into  corpse  after  corpse,  dragged  them  out  of  sight,  marking  their 
path  by  long  red  furrows  in  the  sand  ;  while  the  dog  followed,  until 
his  inauspicious  howlings  died  away  down  distant  passages. 

Philammon  felt  sick  and  giddy,  and  half  rose  to  escape.  But 
Pelagia  !.  .  .  .No, — he  must  sit  it  out,  and  see  the  worst,  if  worse  than 
this  was  possible.  He  looked  round.  The  people  were  coolly  sipping 
wine  and  eating  cakes,  while  they  chatted  admiringly  about  the 
beauty  of  the  great  curtain,  which  had  fallen  and  hidden  the  stage, 
and  represented,  on  a  ground  of  deep-blue  sea,  Europa  carried  by  the 
bull  across  the  Bosphorus,  while  Nereids  and  Tritons  played  around. 

A  single  tiute  within  the  curtain  began  to  send  forth  luscious 
strains,  deadened  and  distant,  as  if  through  far-off  glens  and  wood¬ 
lands  ;  and  from  the  side  passages  issued  three  Graces,  led  by  Peitho, 
the  goddess  of  persuasion;  bearing  a  herald’s  staff  in  her  hand.  She 
advanced  to  the  altar  in  the  center  of  the  orchestra,  and  informed  the 
spectators,  that,  during  the  absence  of  Ares  in  aid  of  a  certain  great 
military  expedition,  which  was  shortly  to  decide  the  diadem  of  Rome, 
and  the  liberty,  and  prosperity,  and  supremacy  of  Egypt  and  Alex¬ 
andria,  Aphrodite  had  returned  to  her  lawful  allegiance,  and  sub¬ 
mitted  for  the  time  being  to  the  commands  of  her  husband,  Hephaes¬ 
tus  ;  that  he,  as  the  deity  of  artificers,  felt. a  peculiar  interest  in  the 
welfare  of  the  city  of  Alexandria,  the  workshop  of  the  world,  and 
had,  as  a  sign  of  his  especial  favor,  prevailed  upon  his  fair  spouse  to 
exhibit,  for  this  once,  her  beauties  to  the  assembled  populace,  and  in 
the  unspoken  poetry  of  motion,  to  represent  to  them  the  emotions 
with  which,  as  she  arose  new-born  from  the  sea,  she  first  surveyed 
that  fair  expanse  of  heaven  and  earth  of  which  she  now  reigned  un¬ 
disputed  queen. 

A  shout  of  rapturous  applause  greeted  this  announcement,  and 
forthwith  limped  from  the  opposite  slip  the  lame  deity  himself,  ham¬ 
mer  and  pincers  on  shoulder,  followed  by  a  train  of  gigantic  Cyclops, 
who  bore  on  their  shoulders  various  pieces  of  gilded  metal-work. 

Hephaestus,  who  was  intended  to  supply  the  comic  element  in  the 
vast  pantomimic  pageant,  shambled  forward  with  studied  uncouth¬ 
ness,  amid  roars  of  laughter  :  surveyed  the  altar  with  ludicrous  con¬ 
tempt  ;  raised  his  mighty  hammer,  shivered  ifto  pieces  with  a  single 
blow,  and  beckoned  to  his  attendants  to  carry  oh  the  fragments,  and 
replace  it  with  something  more  fitting  for  his  august  spouse. 

With  wonderful  quickness  the  metal  open-work  was  put  in  its 
place,  and  fitted  together,  forming  a  frame  of  coral  branches  inter¬ 
mingled  with  dolphins,  Nereids,  and  Tritons.  Four  gigantic  Cyclops 


PAJSfDmiomuM. 


26^ 


then  approached,  staggering  under  the  weight  of  a  circular  slab  of 
green  marble,  polished  to  a  perfect  mirror,  which  they  placed  on 
the  framework.  The  Graces  wreathed  its  circumference  with  gar¬ 
lands  of  sea-weed,  shells,  and  corallines,  and  the  mimic  sea  was  com¬ 
plete. 

Peitho  and  the  Graces  retired  a  few  steps,  and  grouped  themselves 
with  the  Cyclops,  whose  grimed  and  brawny  limbs,  and  hideous  one- 
eyed  masks,  threw  out  in  striking  contrast  the  delicate  hue  and 
grace  of  the  beautiful  maiden  figures  ;  while  Hephaestus  turned 
toward  the  curtain,  and  seemed  to  await  impatiently  the  forthcoming 
of  the  goddess. 

Every  lip  was  breathless  with  expectation  as  the  flutes  swelled 
louder  and  nearer  ;  horns  and  cymbals  took  up  the  harmony  ;  and, 
to  a  triumphant  burst  of  music,  the  curtain  rose,  and  a  simultaneous 
shout  of  delight  burst  from  ten  thousand  voices. 

The  scene  behind  represented  a  magnificent  temple,  half  hidden  in 
an  artificial  wood  of  tropic  trees  and  shrubs,  which  filled  the  stage. 
Fauns  and  Dryads  peeped  laughing  from  among  their  stems,  and 
gorgeous  birds,  tethered  by  unseen  threads,  fluttered  and  sung  among 
their  branches.  In  the  center,  an  overarching  avenue  of  palms  led 
from  the  temple  doors  to  the  front  of  the  stage,  from  which  the 
mimic  battlements  had  disappeared,  and  had  been  replaced,  in  those 
few  moments,  by  a  broad  slope  of  smooth  greensward,  leading  down 
into  the  orchestra,  and  fringed  with  myrtles,  roses,  apple-trees,  pop¬ 
pies,  and  crimson  hyacinths,  stained  wdtli  the  life-blood  of  Adonis. 

The  folding  doors  of  the  temple  opened  slowly  ;  the  crash  of  in¬ 
struments  resounded  from  within  ;  and,  preceded  by  the  musicians, 
came  forth  the  triumph  of  Aphrodite,  and  passed  down  the  slope, 
and  round  the  outer  ring  of  the  orchestra. 

A  splendid  car,  drawn  by  white  oxen,  bore  the  rarest  and  gaudiest 
of  foreign  flowers  and  fruits,  which  young  girls,  dressed  as  Hours 
and  Seasons,  strewed  in  front  of  the  procession  and  among  the  spec¬ 
tators. 

A  long  line  of  beautiful  youths  and  maidens,  crowned  with  gar¬ 
lands,  and  robed  in  scarfs  of  purple  gauze,  followed  by  two  and  two. 
Each  pair  carried  or  led  a  pair  of  wild  animals,  captives  of  the  con¬ 
quering  might  of  Beauty. 

Foremost  were  borne,  on  the  wrists  of  the  actors,  the  birds 
especially  sacred  to  the  goddess, — doves  and  sparrows,  wrynecks  and 
swallows  ;  and  a  pair  of  gigantic  Indian  tortoises,  each  ridden  by  a 
lovely  nymph,  showed  that  Orestes  had  not  forgotten  one  wish,  at 
least,  of  his  intended  bride. 

Then  followed  strange  birds  from  India,  parakeets,  peacocks, 
pheasants,  silver  and  golden  ;  bustards  and  ostriches,  the  latter,  be¬ 
stridden  each  by  a  tiny  cupid,  were  led  on  in  golden  leashes,  followed 
by  antelopes  and  oryxes,  elks  from  beyond  the  Danube,  four-horned  - 
rams  from  the  Isles  of  the  Hyperborean  Ocean,  and  the  strange  hybrid 


y 


264  SYPATiA. 

of  tlie  Libyan  bills,  believed  by  all  spectators  to  be  half  bull,  balf 
horse.  And  then  a  murmur  of  delighted  awe  ran  through  the  thea¬ 
ter,  as  bears  and  leopards,  lions  and  tigers,  fettered  in  heavy  chains 
of  gold,  and  made  gentle  for  the  occasion  by  narcotics,  paced  se¬ 
dately  down  the  slope,  obedient  to  their  beautiful  guides  ;  while 
behind  them  the  unwieldy  bulk  of  two  double-horned  rhinoceroses, 
from  the  far  South,  was  over-topped  by  the  long,  slender  necks  and 
large,  soft  eyes  of  a  pair  of  giraffes,  such  as  had  not  been  seen  in 
Alexandria  for  more  than  fifty  years. 

A  cry  arose  of  “  Orestes  !  Orestes  '  Health  to  the  illustrious  pre¬ 
fect  !  Thanks  for  his  bounty  !  ”  And  a  hired  voice  or  two  among 
the  crowd  cried,  ‘  ‘  Hail  to  Orestes  !  Hail,  Emperor  of  Africa 
But  there  was  no  response. 

“The  rose  is  still  in  the  bud,”  simpered  Orestes  to  Hypatia.  He 
rose,  beckoned  and  bowed  the  crowd  into  silence  ;  and  then,  after  a 
short  pantomimic  exhibition  of  rapturous  g  atitude  and  humility, 
pointed  triumphantly  to  the  palm  avenue,  among  the  shadows  of 
which  appeared  the  wonder  of  the  day, — the  huge  tusks  and  trunk 
of  the  white  elephant  himself. 

There  it  was  at  last !  Not  a  doubt  of  it !  A  real  elephant,  and 
yet  as  white  as  snow.  Sight  never  seen  before  in  Alexandria, — never 
to  be  seen  again  !  “O  thrice  blessed  men  of  Macedonia”  shouted 
some  worthy  on  high,  “  the  gods  are  bountiful  to  you  this  day  !” 
And  all  mouths  and  eyes  confirmed  the  opinion,  as  they  opened 
wider  and  yet  wider  to  drink  in  the  inexhaustible  joy  and  glory. 

On  he  paced  solemnly,  while  the  whole  theater  resounded  to  his 
heavy  tread,  and  the  Fauns  and  Dryads  fled  in  terror.  A  choir  of 
nymphs  swung  round  him  hand  in  hand,  and  sung,  as  they  danced 
along,  the  conquering  might  of  beauty,  the  tamer  of  beasts,  and  men, 
and  deities.  Skirmishing  parties  of  little  winged  cupids  spread 
themselves  over  the  orchestra,  from  left  to  right,  and  pelted  the  spec¬ 
tators  with  perfumed  comfits,  shot  among  them,  from  their  tiny 
bows,  arrows  of  fragrant  sandal- wood,  or  swung  smoking  censers, 
which  loaded  the  air  with  intoxicating  odors. 

The  procession  came  on  down  the  slope,  and  the  elephant  ap¬ 
proached  the  spectators  ;  his  tusks  were  wreathed  with  roses  and 
myrtles;  his  ears  were  pierced  with  splendid  ear-rings,  a  jeweled  front- 
let  hung  between  his  eyes  ;  Eros  himself,  a  lovely  winged  boy,  sat  on 
his  neck,  and  guided  him  with  the  point  of  a  golden  arrow.  But 
what  precious  thing  was  it  which  that  shell-formed  car  upon  his 
back  contained ?  The  goddess?  Pelagia  Aphrodite  herself  ? 

Yes  ;  whiter  than  the  snow-white  elephant,  more  rosy  than  the 
pink-tipped  shell  in  which  she  lay,  among  crimson  cushions  and 
silver  gauze,  there  shone  the  goddess,  thrilling  all  hearts  with  those 
delicious  smiles  and  glances  of  the  bashful,  playful  eyes,  and  grate¬ 
ful  wavings  of  her  tiny  hand,  as  the  whole  theater  rose  with  one  ac¬ 
cord,  and  ten  thousand  eyes  were  concentrated  on  the  unequaled  love¬ 
liness  beneath  them. 


PANDEMONIUM. 


265 


Twice  the  procession  passed  round  the  whole  circumference  of 
the  orchestra,  and  then,  returning  from  the  foot  of  the  slope 
toward  the  central  group  around  Hephaestus,  deployed  right  and  left 
in  front  of  the  st0,ge.  The  lions  and  tigers  were  led  away  into  the 
side  passages  ;  the  youths  and  maidens  combined  tliemseives  with 
the  gentler  animals  into  groups  lessening  gradually  from  the  center 
to  the  wings,  and  stood  expectant,  while  the  elephant  came  forward 
and  knelt  behind  the  platform  destined  for  the  goddess. 

The  valves  of  the  shell  closed.  The  Graces  unloosed  the  fasten¬ 
ings  of  the  car.  The  elephant  turned  his  trunk  over  his  back,  and, 
guided  by  the  soft  hands  of  the  girls,  grasped  the  shell,  and,  lifting- 
it  high  in  air,  deposited  it  on  the  steps  at  the  back  of  the  platform. 

Hephaestus  limped  forward,  and  with  his  most  uncouth  gestures 
signified  the  delight  which  he  had  in  bestowing  such  a  sight  upon  his 
faithful  artisans  of  Alexandria,  and  the  unspeakable  enjoyment  which 
they  were  to  expect  from  the  mystic  dance  of  the  goddess  ;  and  then 
retired,  leaving  the  Graces  to  advance  in  front  of  the  platform,  and, 
with  their  arms  twined  round  each  other,  begin  Hypatia’s  song  of 
invocation. 

As  the  first  strophe  died  away,  the  valves  of  the  shell  re-opened 
and  discovered  Aphrodite  crouching  on  one  knee  within.  She  raised 
her  head,  and  gazed  around  the  vast  circle  of  seats.  A  mild  surprise 
was  on  her  countenance,  which  quickened  into  delighted  wonder, 
and  bashf  Illness  struggling  with  the  sense  of  new  enjoyment  and  new 
powers.  She  glanced  down  at  herself ;  and  smiled,  astonished  at 
her  own  loveliness  ;  then  upward  at  the  sky  ;  and  seemed  ready,  with 
an  awful  joy,  to  spring  up  into  the  boundless  void.  Her  whole  fig¬ 
ure  dilated  ;  she  seemed  to  drink  in  strength  from  every  object  which 
met  her  in  the  great  universe  around  ;  and,  slowly,  from  among  the 
shells  and  sea- weeds,  she  rose  to  her  full  height,  the  mystic  cestus 
glittering  round  her  waist,  in  deep  festoons  of  emeralds  and  pearls, 
and  stepped  forward  upon  the  marble  sea-floor,  wringing  the  drip¬ 
ping  perfume  from  her  locks,  as  Aphrodite  rose  of  old. 

For  the  first  minute,  the  crowd  was  too  breathless  with  pleasure 
to  think  of  applause.  But  the  goddess  seemed  to  require  due  hom¬ 
age  ;  and  when  she  folded  her  arms  across  her  bosom,  and  stood 
motionless  for  an  instant,  as  if  to  demand  the  worship  of  the  uni¬ 
verse,  every  tongue  was  loosed,  and  a  thunder-clap  of  “  Aphrodite  !  ” 
rung  out  across  the  roofs  of  Alexandria,  and  startled  Cyril  in  his 
chamber  at  the  Scrapeium,  and  weary  muleteers  on  distant  sand¬ 
hills,  and  dozing  mariners  far  out  at  sea. 

And  then  began  a  miracle  of  art,  such  as  was  only  possible  among 
a  people  of  the  free  and  exquisite  physical  training  and  the  delicate 
/esthetic  perception  of  those  old  Greeks,  even  in  their  most  fallen 
days.  A  dance,  in  which  every  motion  was  a  word,  and  rest  as  elo¬ 
quent  as  motion  ;  in  which  every  attitude  was  a  fresh  motive  for  a 
sculptor  of  the  purest  school,  and  the  highest  physical  activity  was 


266 


HYPATIA 


manifested,  not,  as  in  tlie  coarser  comic  pantomimes,  in  fantastic 
bounds  and  unnatural  distortions,  but  in  perpetual  delicate  modula¬ 
tions  of  a  stately  and  self-restraining  grace.  The  artist  was  for  the 
moment  transformed  into  the  goddess.  The  theater  and  Alexandria, 
and  the  gorgeous  pageant  beyond,  had  vanished  from  Imr  imagina¬ 
tion,  and  therefore  from  the  imagination  of  the  spectators,  under  the 
constraining  inspiration  of  her  art,  and  they  and  she  alike  -aw  noth¬ 
ing  but  the  lonely  sea  around  Cythera,  and  the  goddess  hovering 
above  its  emerald  mirror,  raying  forth  on  sea,  and  air,  and  shore, 
beauty,  and  joy,  and  love . 

Philammon’s  eyes  were  bursting  from  his  head  with  shame  and 
horror  :  and  yet  he  could  not  hate  her  ;  not  even  despise  her.  He 
would  have  done  so,  had  there  been  the  faintest  trace  of  human  feel¬ 
ing  in  her  counteiyince,  to  prove  that  some  germ  of  moral  sense 
lingered  within  ;  but  even  the  faint  blush  and  the  downcast  eye,  with 
which  she  had  entered  the  theater,  were  gone  ;  and  the  only  expres¬ 
sion  on  her  face  was  that  of  intense  enjoyment  of  her  own  activity 
and  skill,  and  satisfied  vanity,  as  of  a  petted  child . Was  she  ac¬ 

countable  ?  A  reasonable  soul,  capable  of  right  or  wrong  at  all  ?  hie 

hoped  not . He  would  trust  not . And  still  Pelagia  danced  on  ; 

and  for  a  whole  age  of  agony,  he  could  see  nothing  in  heaven  or  earth 
but  the  bewildering  maze  of  those  white  feet,  as  they  twinkled  over 

their  white  image  in  the  marble  mirror . At  last  it  was  over. 

Every  limb  suddenly  collapsed,  and  she  stood  drooping  in  soft,  self- 
satisfied  fatigue,  awaiting  the  burst  of  applause  which  rung  through 
Philammon’s  ears,  proclaiming  to  heaven  and  earth,  as  with  a  mighty 
trumpet-blast,  his  sister’s  shame. 

The  elephant  rose  and  moved  forward  to  the  side  of  the  slabs. 
His  back  was  covered  with  crimson  cushions,  on  which  it  seemed 
Aphrodite  was  to  return  without  her  shell.  She  folded  her  arms 
across  her  bosom,  and  stood  smiling,  as  the  elephant  gently  wreathed 
his  trunk  around  her  waist,  and  lifted  her  slowly  from  the  slab,  in 
act  to  place  her  on  his  back . 

The  little  feet,  clinging  half  fearfully  together,  had  just  risen 
from  the  marble. — The  elephant  started,  dropped  his  delicate  burden 
heavily  on  the  slab,  looked  down,  raised  his  forefoot,  and  throwing 
his  trunk  into  the  air,  gave  a  shrill  scream  of  terror  and  disgust . 

The  foot  was  red  with  blood, — the  young  boy’s  blood, — which  was 
soaking  and  bubbling  up  through  the  fresh  sand  where  the  elephant 
had  trodden,  in  a  round,  dark,  purple  spot . 

Philammon  could  bear  no  more.  Another  moment,  and  he  had 
hurled  down  through  the  dense  mass  of  spectators,  clearing  rank 
after  rank  of  seats  by  the  sheer  strength  of  madness,  leaped  the  bal¬ 
ustrade  into  the  orchestra  below,  and  rushed  across  the  space  to  the 
foot  of  the  platform. 

“Pelagia!  Sister!  My  sister  !  Have  mercy  on  me  !  on  yourself  ! 
I  will  hide  you  !  save  you  !  and  we  will  flee  together  out  of  this  in¬ 
fernal  place  !  this  world  of  devils  !  I  am  your  brother  !  Come  !  ” 


PANDEMONIUM.  267 

-  She  looked  at  him  one  moment  with  wide,  wild  eyes - The  truth 

flashed  on  her - 

“  Brother  !  ” 

And  she  sprung  from  the  platform  into  his  arms . A  vision  of  a 

lofty  window  in  Athens,  looking  out  over  far  olive-yards  and  gardens, 
and  the  bright  roofs  and  basins  of  the  Piraeus,  and  the  broad  blue 

sea,  with  the  purple  peaks  of  ^gina  beyond  all . And  a  dark-eyed 

boy,  with  his  arm  around  her  neck,  pointed  laughing  to  the  twinkling 

masts  in  the  far  harbor,  and  called  her  sister . The  dead  soul  woke 

within  her  ;  and  with  a  wild  cry  she  recoiled  from  him  in  an  agony 
of  shame,  and,  covering  her  face  with  both  her  hands,  sunk  down 
among  the  blood-stained  sand, 

A  yell,  as  of  all  hell  broke  loose,  rung  along  that  vast  circle, — 

“Down  with  him!”  “Away  with  him!”  “  Crucify  the  slave!” 
“Give  the  barbarian  to  the  beasts!”  “To  the  beasts  with  him, 
noble  prefect  !  ”  A  crowd  of  attendants  rushed  upon  him,  and  many 
of  the  spectators  sprung  from  their  seats,  and  were  on  the  point  of 
leaping  down  into  the  orchestra. 

Philammon  turned  upon  them  like  a  lion  at  bay  ;  and  clear  and 
loud  his  voice  rose  through  the  roar  of  the  multitude. 

“  Ay  !  murder  me  as  the  Bomans  murdered  Saint  Telemachus  ! 
Slaves  as  besotted  and  accursed  as  your  besotted  and  accursed  ty¬ 
rants  !  Lower  than  the  beasts  whom  you  employ  as  your  butchers  ! 
Murder  and  lust  go  fitly  hand  in  hand,  and  the  throne  of  my  sister’s 
shame  is  well  built  on  the  blood  of  innocents  !  Let  my  death  end  the 
devil’s  sacrifice,  and  fill  up  the  cup  of  your  iniquity  !  ” 

“  To  the  beasts  !  ”  “  Make  the  elephant  trample  him  to  powder  !  ” 

And  the  huge  brute,  goaded  on  by  the  attendants,  rushed  on  the 
youth,  while  Eros  leaped  from  his  neck,  and  fled  weeping  up  the 
slope. 

He  caught  Philammon  in  his  trunk  and  raised  him  high  in  air. 
For  an  instant  the  great  bellowing  ocean  of  heads  spun  round  and 
round.  He  tried  to  breathe  one  prayer,  and  shut  his  eyes;  Pelagia’s 
voice  rung  sweet  and  clear,  even  in  the  shrillness  of  intensest  agony, — 

“  Spare  him  !  He  is  my  brother  !  Forgive  him,  men  of  Macedo¬ 
nia  !  For  Pelagia’s  sake, — your  Pelagia  !  One  boon,  — only  this 
one  !  ” 

And  she  stretched  her  arms  imploringly  toward  the  spectators; 
and  then,  clasping  the  huge  knees  of  the  elephant,  called  madly  to  it 
in  terms  of  passionate  entreaty  and  endearment. 

The  men  wavered.  The  brute  did  not.  Quietly  he  lowered  his 
trunk,  and  set  down  Philammon  on  his  feet.  The  monk  was  saved. 
Breathless  and  dizzy,  he  found  himself  hurried  away  by  the  attend¬ 
ants,  dragged  through  dark  passages,  and  hurled  out  into  the  street, 
with  curses,  warnings,  and  congratulations,  which  fell  on  an  unheed 
ing  ear. 

But  Pelagia  kept  her  face  still  hidden  in  her  hands,  and  rising. 


268 


HYPATIA. 


walked  slowly  back,  crushed  by  tlie  weight  of  some  tremendous  awe, 
across  the  orchestra,  and  up  the  slope  ;  and  vanished  among  the 
palms  and  oleanders,  regardless  of  the  applause,  and  entreaties,  and 
jeers,  and  threats,  and  curses,  of  that  great  multitude  of  sinful 
slaves. 

For  a  moment  all  Orestes’s  spells  seemed  broken  by  this  unexpected 
catastrophe.  A  cloud,  whether  of  disgust  or  of  disappointment,  hung 
upon  every  brow.  More  than  one  Christian  rose  hastily  to  depart, 
touched  with  real  remorse  and  shame  at  the  horrors  of  which  they 
had  been  the  willing  witnesses.  The  common  people  behind,  having 
glutted  their  curiosity  with  all  that  there  was  to  see,  began  openly  to 
murmur  at  the  cruelty  and  heathenry  of  it.  Hypatia,  utterly  un¬ 
nerved,  hid  her  face  in  both  her  hands.  Orestes  alone  rose  with  the 
crisis.  Now,  or  never,  was  the  time  for  action  ;  and  stepping  for¬ 
ward,  with  his  most  graceful  obeisance,  waved  his  hand  for  silence, 
and  began  his  well-studied  oration. 

“Let  me  not,  0  men  of  Macedonia,  suppose  that  you  can  be  dis¬ 
turbed  from  that  equanimity  which  befits  politicians,  by  so  light  an 
accident  as  the  caprice  of  a  dancer.  The  spectacle  which  I  have  had 
the  honor  and  delight  of  exhibiting  to  you, — (roars  and  applause  from 
the  liberated  prisoners  and  the  young  gentlemen,) — and  on  which  it 
seemed  to  me  you  had  deigned  to  look  with  not  altogether  unkindly 
eyes, — (fresh  applause,  in  which  the  Christian  mob,  relenting,  began 
to  join,) — is  but  a  pleasant  prelude  to  that  more  serious  business  for 
which  I  have  drawn  you  here  together.  Other  testimonies  of  my 
good  intentions  have  not  been  wanting  in  the  release  of  suffering  in¬ 
nocence,  and  in  the  largess  of  food,  the  growth  and  natural  property 
of  Egypt,  destined  by  your  late  tyrants  to  pamper  the  luxury  of  a 

distant  court . Why  should  I  boast? — yet  even  now  this  head  is 

weary,  these  limbs  fail  me,  worn  out  in  ceaseless  efforts  for  your  wel¬ 
fare,  and  in  the  perpetual  administration  of  the  strictest  justice. 
For  a  time  has  come  in  which  the  Macedonian  race,  whose  boast  is 
the  gorgeous  city  of  Alexander,  must  rise  again  to  that  political  pre¬ 
eminence  which  tliey  held  of  old,  and,  becoming  once  more  the  mas¬ 
ters  of  one-third  of  the  universe,  be  treated  by  their  rulers  as  free¬ 
men,  citizens,  heroes,  who  have  a  right  ta  choose  and  to  employ  their 
rulers. — Eulers,  did  I  say  ?  Let  us  forget  the  word,  and  substitute 
in  its  place  the  more  philosophic  term  of  ministers.  To  be  your  min¬ 
ister, — the  servant  of  you  all, — to  sacrifice  myself,  my  leisure,  health, 
life,  if  need  be,  to  the  one  great  object  of  securing  the  independence 
of  Alexandria, — this  is  my  work,  my  hope,  my  glory, — longed  for 
through  weary  years  ;  now  for  the  first  time  possible  l3y  the  fall  of 
the  late  puppet  Emperor  of  Rome.  Men  of  Macedonia,  remember 
that  Honorius  reigns  no  more  !  An  African  sits  on  the  throne  of  the 
Caesars  !  Heraclian,  by  one  decisive  victory,  has  gained,  by  the  favor 
of — of  Heaven,  the  imperial  purple  ;  and  a  new  era  opens  for  the 
world.  Let  the  conqueror  of  Rome  balance  his  account  with  that 


PANDEMONIUM.  269 

Byzantine  Court,  so  long  tlie  incubus  of  our  Trans-Mediterranean 
wealth  and  civilization  ;  and  let  a  free,  independent,  and  united  Africa 
rally  round  the  palaces  and  docks  of  Alexandria,  and  find  there  its 
natural  center  of  polity  and  of  prosperity.” 

A  roar  of  hired  applause  interrupted  him  ;  and  not  a  few,  half  for 
the  sake  of  his  compliments  and  fine  words,  half  from  a  natural  wish 
to  be  on  the  right  side, — namely,  the  one  which  happened  to  be  in 

the  ascendant  for  the  time  being, — joined . The  city  authorities 

were  on  the  point  of  crying,  “  Imperator  Orestes,”  but  thought  better 
of  it,  and  waited  for  some  one  else  to  cry  first, — being  respectable. 
Whereon,  the  Prefect  of  the  Guards,  being  a  man  of  some  presence 
of  mind,  and  also  not  in  any  wise  respectable,  pricked  up  the  Prefect 
of  the  Docks  with  the  point  of  his  dagger,  and  bade  him,  with  a 
fearful  threat,  take  care  lipw  he  played  traitor.  The  worthy  burgher 
roared  incontinently, — whether  with  pain  or  patriotism  ;  and  the 
whole  array  of  respectabilities,  having  found  a  Curtius  who  would 
leap  into  the  gulf,  joined  in  unanimous  chorus,  and  saluted  Orestes 
as  Emperor  ;  while  Hypatia,  amid  the  shouts  of  her  aristocratic 
scholars,  rose  and  knelt  before  him,  writhing  inwardly  with  shame 
and  despair,  and  entreated  him  to  accept  that  tutelage  of  Greek  com¬ 
merce,  supremacy,  and  philosophy  which  was  forced  on  him  by  the 
unanimous  voice  of  an  adoring  people . 

"It  is  false  !  ”  shouted  a  voice  from  the  highest  tiers,  appropriated 
to  the  women  of  the  lower  classes,  which  made  all  turn  their  heads 
in  bewilderment. 

"False  !  false  !  You  are  tricked  !  He  is  tricked  !  Heraclian  was 
utterly  routed  at  Ostia,  and  is  fled  to  Carthage,  with  the  emperor’s 
fleet  in  chase,” 

"  She  lies  !  Drag  the  beast  down  !”  cried  Orestes,  utterly  thrown 
off  his  balance  by  the  sudden  check, 

"  She  ?  He  !  I,  a  monk,  brought  the  news  !  Cyril  has  known  it, 
every  Jew  in  the  Delta  has  known  it,  for  a  week  past  !  So  j^erish  all 
the  enemies  of  the  Lord,  caught  in  their  own  snare  !  ” 

And  bursting  desperately  through  the  women  who  surrounded 
him,  the  monk  vanished. 

An  awful  silence  fell  on  all  who  heard.  For  a  minute  every  man 
looked  in  his  neighbor’s  face  as  if  he  longed  to  cut  his  throat,  and  get 
rid  of  one  witness,  at  least,  of  his  treason.  And  then  arose  a  tumult, 
which  Orestes  in  vain  attempted  to  subdue.  Whether  the  populace 
believed  the  monk’s  words  or  not,  they  were  panic-stricken  at  the 
mere  possibility  of  their  truth.  Hoarse  with  denying,  protesting, 
appealing,  the  would-be  emperor  had  at  last  to  summon  his  guards 
around  him  and  Hypatia,  and  make  his  way  out  of  the  theater  as 
best  he  could  ;  while  the  multitude  melted  away  like  snow  before  the 
rain,  and  poured  out  into  the  streets  in  eddying  and  roaring  streams, 
to  find  every  church  placarded  by  Cyril  with  the  particulars  of  Her- 
acJian’s  ruin. 


I 


OIIaPTER  xxih. 

NEMESIS. 

That  evening  was  a  hideous  one  in  tlie  palace  of  Orestes.  His 
agonies  of  disappointment,  rage,  and  terror  were  at  once  so  sliameful 
and  so  fearful  that  none  of  his  slaves  dare  approach  him  ;  and  it  was 
not  till  late  that  his  confidential  secretary,  the  Chaldean  eunuch, 
driven  by  terror  of  the  exasperated  Catholics,  ventured  into  the  tiger’s 
den,  and  represented  to  him  the  immediate  necessity  for  action. 

What  could  he  do?  He  was  committed,  Cyril  only  knew  how 
deeply.  What  might  not  the  wily  archbishop  have  discovered  ? 
What  might  he  not  pretend  to  have  discovered  ?  What  accusations 
might  he  not  send  off  on  the  spot  to  the  Byzantine  Court  ? 

“  Let  the  gates  be  guarded,  and  no  one  allowed  to  leave  the  city,” 
suggested  the  Chaldee. 

“  Keep  in  monks  ?  as  well  keep  in  rats  !  No  ;  we  must  send  off  a 
counter-report,  instantly.” 

“  What  shall  I  say,  your  excellency?  ”  quoth  the  ready  scribe,  pull¬ 
ing  out  pen  and  inkhorn  from  his  sash. 

‘  ‘  What  do  I  care  ?  Any  lie  which  comes  to  hand.  What  in  the 
Devil’s  name  are  you  here  for  at  all,  but  to  invent  a  lie  when  I  want 
one  ?  ” 

“  True,  most  noble,”  and  the  worthy  sat  meekly  down  to  his  pa¬ 
per.  . .  .but  did  not  proceed  rapidly. 

“  1  don’t  see  anything  that  would  suit  the  emergency,  unless  I 
stated,  with  your  august  leave,  that  Cyril,  and  not  you,  celebrated 
the  gladiatorial  exhibition  ;  which  might  hardly  appear  credible  ?  ” 

Orestes  burst  out  laughing,  in  spite  of  himself.  The  sleek  Chaldee 
smiled,  and  purred  in  return.  The  victory  was  won  ;  and  Orestes, 
somewhat  master  of  himself,  began  to  turn  his  vulpine  cunning  to 
the  one  absorbing  question  of  the  saving  of  his  worthless  neck. 

“No,  that  would  be  too  good.  Write  that  we  have  discovered  a 
plot  on  Cyril’s  part  to  incorporate  the  whole  of  the  African  churches 
(mind  and  specify  Carthage  and  Hippo)  under  his  own  jurisdiction, 
and  to  throw  off  allegiance  to  the  Patriarch  of  Constantinople,  in  case 
of  Heraclian’s  success.” 

The  secretary  purred  delighted  approval,  and  scribbled  away  now 
with  right  good  heart. 

“  Heraclian’s  success,  your  excellency.” 

“We  of  course  desired,  by  every  means  in  our  power,  to  gratify 
the  people  of  Alexandria,  and,  as  was  our  duty,  to  excite  by  every 

( 270  ) 


lawful  method  their  loyalty  toward  the  throne  of  the  Caesars  (never 
mind  who  sat  on  it)  at  so  critical  a  moment.” 

“  So  critical  a  moment.”. . . . 

“  But  as  faithful  Catholics,  and  abhorring,  even  in  the  extremest 
need,  the  sin  of  Uzzah,  we  dreaded  to  touch  with  the  unsanctified 
hands  of  laymen  the  consecrated  ark  of  the  Church,  even  though  for 
its  preservation.”. . . . 

“  Its  preservation,  your  excellency.”. . . . 

“We  therefore,  as  civil  magistrates,  felt  bound  to  confine  ourselves 
to  those  means  which  were  already  allowed  by  law  and  custom  to  our 
jurisdiction  ;  and  accordingly  made  use  of  those  largesses,  spectacles, 
and  public  execution  of  rebels,  which  have  unhappily  appeared  to 
his  holiness  the  patriarch  (too  ready,  perhaps,  to  find  a  cause  of  com¬ 
plaint  against  faithful  adherents  of  the  Byzantine  See)  to  partake  of 
the  nature  of  those  gladiatorial  exhibitions,  which  are  equally  abhor¬ 
rent  to  the  spirit  of  the  Catholic  Church,  and  to  the  charity  of  the 
sainted  emperors  by  whose  pious  edicts  they  have  been  long  since 
abolished.” 

“  Your  excellency  is  indeed  great.  . .  .but — pardon  your  slave’s  re¬ 
mark — my  simplicity  is  of  opinion  that  it  may  be  asked  why  you  did 
not  inform  the  Augusta  Pulcheria  of  Cyril’s  conspiracy  ?  ” 

“  Say  that  we  sent  a  messenger  oif  three  months  ago,  but  that. . . . 
Make  something  happen  to  him,  stupid,  and  save  me  the  trouble.” 

‘  ‘  Shall  I  kill  him  by  Arabs  in  the  neighborhood  of  Palmyra,  your 
excellency  ?” 

“Let  me  see . No.  They  may  make  inquiries  there.  Drown 

him  at  sea.  Nobody  can  ask  questions  of  the  sharks.” 

“  Foundered  between  Tyre  and  Crete,  from  which  sad  calamity  only 
one  man  escaped  on  a  raft,  and  being  picked  up,  after  three  weeks*  ex¬ 
posure  to  the  fury  of  the  elements,  by  a  returning  wheat-ship - 

By  the  by,  most  noble,  what  am  I  to  say  about  those  wheat-ships 
not  having  even  sailed  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  Head  of  Augustus  !  I  forgot  them  utterly.  Say  that — say  that 
the  plague  was  making  such  ravages  in  the  harbor  quarter  that  we 
feared  their  carrying  the  infection  to  the  seat  of  the  empire  ;  and  let 
them  sail  to-morrow.” 

The  secretary’s  face  lengthened. 

“My  fidelity  is  compelled  to  remark,  even  at  the  risk  of  your  just 
indignation,  that  half  of  them  have  been  unloaded  again  for  your 
munificent  largesses  of  the  last  two  days.” 

Orestes  swore  a  great  oath. 

“  O  that  the  mob  had  but  one  throat,  that  I  might  give  them  an 
emetic  !  Well,  we  must  buy  more  corn,  that’s  all.” 

The  secretary’s  face  grew  longer  still. 

“  The  Jews,  most  august- - ” 

“  What  of  them?”  yelled  the  hapless  prefect.  “  Have  they  been 
forestalling  ?  ” 


HYPATIA. 


“  My  assiduity  has  discovered  this  afternoon  that  they  have  heeh 
buying  up  and  exporting  all  the  provisions  which  they  could  obtain,” 

“  Scoundrels  !  Then  they  must  have  known  of  Heraclian’s 
failure  !  ” 

“  Your  sagacity  has,  I  fear,  divined  the  truth.  They  have  been 
betting  largely  against  his  success  for  the  last  week,  both  in  Canopus 
and  Pelusium.” 

“For  the  last  week!  Then  Miriam  betrayed  me  knowingly!” 
And  Orestes  broke  forth  again  into  a  paroxysm  of  fury. 

■'  Here, — call  the  tribune  of  the  guard  !  A  hundred  gold  pieces  to 
the  man  who  brings  me  the  witch  alive  !  ” 

“  She  will  never  be  taken  alive.” 

“  Dead,  then, — in  any  way  !  Go,  you  Chaldee  hound  !  what  are 
you  hesitating  about  ?  ” 

“Most  noble  lord,”  said  the  secretary,  prostrating  himself  upon 

the  floor,  and  kissing  his  master’s  feet  in  an  agony  of  fear . “  Ke- 

member,  that  if  you  touch  one  Jew,  you  touch  all  !  Remember  the 
bonds  !  remember  the — the — your  own  most  august  reputation,  in 
short.” 

“  Get  up,  brute,  and  don’t  grovel  there,  but  tell  me  what  you  mean, 
like  a  human  being.  If  old  Miriam  is  once  dead,  her  bonds  die  with 
her,  don’t  they  ?  ” 

“Alas  !  my  lord,  you  do  not  know  the  customs  of  that  accursed 
folk.  They  have  a  damnable  practice  of  treating  every  member  of 
their  nation  as  a  brother,  and  helping  each  freely  and  faithfully 
without  reward  ;  whereby  they  are  enabled  to  plunder  all  the  rest  of 
the  world,  and  thrive  themselves,  from  the  least  to  the  greatest. 
Don’t  fancy  that  your  bonds  are  in  Miriam’s  hands.  They  have  been 
transferred  months  ago.  Your  real  creditors  may  be  in  Carthage,  or 
Rome,  or  Byzantium,  and  they  will  attack  you  from  thence  ;  while 
all  that  you  would  And,  if  you  seized  the  old  witch’s  property,  would 
be  papers,  useless  to  you,  belonging  to  Jews  all  over  the  empire,  who 
would  rise  as  one  man  in  defense  of  their  money.  I  assure  you,  it  is 
a  net  without  a  bound.  If  you  touch  one,  you  touch  all . And  be¬ 

sides,  my  diligence,  expecting  some  such  command,  has  already  taken 
the  liberty  of  making  inquiries  as  to  Miriam’s  place  of  abode  ; 
but  it  appears,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  utterly  unknown  to  any  of  your 
excellency’s  servants.” 

“  You  lie  !  ”  said  Orestes . “I  would  much  sooner  believe  that 

you  have  been  warning  the  hag  to  keep  out  of  the  way.” 

Orestes  had  spoken,  for  that  once  in  his  life,  the  exact  truth. 

The  secretary,  who  had  his  own  private  dealings  with  Miriam,  felt 
every  particular  atom  of  his  skin  shudder  at  those  words,  and,  had 
he  had  hair  on  his  head,  it  would  certainly  have  betrayed  him  by 
standing  visibly  on  end.  But  as  he  was,  luckily  for  him,  close 
shaven,  his  turban  remained  in  its  proper  place,  as  he  meekly 
replied, - 


NEME8I8. 


273 


Alas  !  a  faitliful  servant  can  feel  no  keener  woe  tlian  tlie  cause¬ 
less  suspicion  of  that  sun  before  whose  rays  he  daily  prostrates 
his - 

“ Confound  your  periphrases  !  Do  you  know  where  she  is?” 

“  No  !”  cried  the  wretched  secretary,  driven  to  the  lie  direct  at 
last ;  and  confirmed  the  negation  with  such  a  string  of  oaths,  that 
Orestes  stopped  his  volubility  with  a  kick,  borrowed  of  him,  under 
threat  of  torture,  a  thousand  gold  pieces  as  largess  to  the  soldiery, 
and  ended  by  concentrating  the  stationaries  round  his  own  palace, 
for  the  double  purpose  of  protecting  himself  in  case  of  a  riot,  and  of 
increasing  the  chances  of  the  said  riot,  by  leaving  the  distant 
quarters  of  the  city  without  police. 

‘  ‘  If  Cyril  would  but  make  a  fool  of  himself,  now  that  he  is  in  the 
full-blown  pride  of  victory, — the  rascal ! — about  that  Animonius,  or 
about  Hypatia,  or  anything  else,  and  give  me  a  real  handle  against 
him  !  After  all,  truth  works  better  than  lying  now  and  then.  O  that 
I  could  poison  him  !  But  one  can’t  bribe  those  ecclesiastics  ;  and  as 
for  the  dagger,  one  could  not  hire  a  man  to  be  torn  to  pieces  by 
monks.  No  ;  I  must  just  sit  still,  and  see  what  Fortune’s  dice  may 
turn  up.  Well ;  your  pedants  like  Aristides  or  Epaminondas — thank 
heaven,  the  race  of  them  lias  died  out  long  ago  I — might  call  this  no 
very  creditable  piece  of  provincial  legislation  ;  but,  after  all,  it  is 
about  as  good  as  any  now  going,  or  likely  to  be  going,  till  the  world’s 
end  ;  and  one  can’t  be  expected  to  strike  out  a  new  path.  I  shall 
stick  to  the  wisdom  of  my  predecessors,  and — O  that  Cyril  may  make 
a  fool  of  himself  to-night  !  ” 

And  Cyril  did  make  a  fool  of  himself  that  night,  for  the  first  and 
last  time  in  his  life  ;  and  suffers  for  it,  as  wise  men  are  wont  to  do 
when  they  err,  to  this  very  day  and  hour  :  but  how  much  Orestes 
gained  by  his  foe’s  false  move  cannot  be  decided  till  the  end  of  thia 
story  ;  perhaps  not  even  then. 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 


LOST  LAMBS. 


And  Philammon? 

For  a  long  while  he  stood  in  the  street  outside  the  theater,  too 
much  maddened  to  determine  on  any  course  of  action ;  and,  ere  he 
had  recovered  his  self-possession,  the  crowd  began  to  pour  from  every 
outlet,  and,  filling  the  street,  swept  him  away  in  its  stream. 

Then,  as  he  heard  his  sister’s  name,  in  every  tone  of  pity,  con¬ 
tempt,  and  horror,  mingle  with  their  angry  exclamations,  lie  awoke 
from  his  dream,  and,  bursting  through  the  mob,  made  straight  for 
Pelagia’s  house. 

It  was  fast  closed  ;  and  his  repeated  knocks  at  the  gate  brought 
only,  after  long  waiting,  a  surly  negro  face  to  a  little  wicket. 

He  asked  eagerly  and  instinctively  for  Pelagia  :  of  course  she  had 
not  yet  returned.  For  Wulf  :  he  was  not  within.  And  then  he  took 
his  station  close  to  the  gateway,  while  his  heart  beat  loud  with  hope 
and  dread. 

At  last  the  Goths  appeared,  forcing  tlieir  way  through  the  mob  in 
a  close  column.  There  were  no  litters  with  them.  Where,  then, 
were  Pelagia  and  her  girls  ?  Where,  too,  was  the  hated  figure  of 
the  Amal?  and  Wulf,  and  Smid?  The  men  came  on,  led  by  Goderic 
and  Agilmund,  with  folded  arms,  knit  brows,  downcast  eyes  ;  a  stern 
disgust,  not  unmingled  with  shame,  on  every  countenance,  told  Phil¬ 
ammon  afresh  of  his  sister’s  infamy, 

Goderic  passed  him  close,  and  Philammon  summoned  up  courage 
to  ask  for  Wulf . Pelagia  he  had  not  courage  to  name. 

“Out,  Greek  hound  !  We  have  seen  enough  of  your  accursed 
race  to-day  !  What  ?  are  you  trying  to  follow  us  in  ?  ”  And  the 
young  man’s  sword  hashed  from  its  sheath  so  swiftly,  that  Philam¬ 
mon  had  but  just  time  enough  to  spring  back  into  the  street,  and 
wait  there,  in  an  agony  of  disappointment  and  anxiety,  as  the  gates 
slid  together  again,  and  the  house  was  as  silent  as  before. 

For  a  miserable  hour  he  waited,  while  the  mob  thickened  instead 
of  fiowing  away,  and  the  scattered  groups  of  chatterers  began  to 
form  themselves  into  masses,  and  parade  the  streets  with  shouts  of 
“Down  with  the  heathen!”  “Down  with  the  idolaters  1  ”  “Ven¬ 
geance  on  all  blaspheming  harlots  !  ” 

At  last  the  steady  tramp  of  legionaries,  and  in  the  midst  of  the 
glittering  lines  of  armed  men — O  joy  I — a  string  of  litters  ! 

( 374 ) 


LOST  LAMBS, 


275 


He  sprung  forward,  and  called  Pelagia’s  name  again  and  again. 
Once  lie  fancied  lie  lieard  an  answer  ;  but  the  soldiers  thrust  him 
back. 

“  She  is  safe  here,  young  fool,  and  has  seen  and  been  seen  quite 
enough  to-day  already.  Back  !  ” 

“  Let  me  speak  to  her  !  ” 

That  is  her  business.  Ours  is  now  to  see  her  home  safe.” 

“Let  me  go  in  with  you,  I  beseech  !  ” 

“If  you  want  to  go  in,  knock  for  yourself  when  we  are  gone.  Il 
you  have  any  business  in  the  house,  they  will  open  to  you,  I  sup¬ 
pose.  Out,  you  interfering  puppy  !  ” 

And  a  blow  of  the  spear-butt  in  his  chest  sent  him  rolling  back  into 
the  middle  of  the  street,  while  the  soldiers,  having  delivered  uptbeir 
charge,  returned  with  the  same  stolid  indifference.  In  vain  Pliilam- 
mon,  returning,  knocked  at  the  gate.  Curses  and  threats  from  the 
negro  were  all  the  answer  which  he  received  ;  and  at  last,  wearied 
into  desperation,  he  wandered  away,  up  one  street  and  down  another, 
struggling  in  vain  to  form  some  plan  of  action  for  himself,  until  the 
sun  was  set. 

Wearily  he  went  homewards  at  last.  Once  the  thought  of  Miriam 
crossed  his  mind.  It  was  a  disgusting  alternative  to  ask  help  of  her, 
the  very  author  of  his  sister’s  shame  ;  but  yet  she  at  least  could  ob¬ 
tain  for  him  a  sight  of  Pelagia  ;  she  had  promised  as  much.  But 
then — the  condition  which  she  had  appended  to  her  help  !  To  see 
his  sister,  and  yet  to  have  her  as  she  was  ! — Horrible  contradiction  ! 
But  could  he  not  employ  Miriam  for  his  own  ends  ? — outwit  her? — 
deceive  her  ? — for  it  came  to  that.  The  temptation  was  intense  ;  but 
it  lasted  only  a  moment.  Could  he  defile  so  pure  a  cause  by  false¬ 
hood?  And  hurrying  past  the  Jewess’s  door,  hardly  daring  to  look 
at  it,  lest  the  temptation  should  return,  he  darted  up-stairs  to  his  own 
little  chamber,  hastily  flung  open  the  door,  and  stopped  short  in  as¬ 
tonishment. 

A  woman,  covered  from  head  to  foot  in  a  large  dark  veil,  stood  in 
the  center  of  the  chamber. 

“Who  are  you?  This  is  no  place  for  you  !  ”  cried  he,  after  a  mo¬ 
ment’s  pause.  She  replied  only  by  a  shudder  and  a  sob . He 

caught  sight,  beneath  the  folds  of  the  veil,  of  a  too- well -known  saf- 
„fron  shawl,  and,  springing  upon  her  like  the  lion  on  the  lamb, 
clasped  to  his  bosom  his  sister. 

The  veil  fell  from  her  beautiful  forehead.  She  gazed  into  his  eyes 
one  moment  with  a  look  of  terrified  inquiry,  and  saw  nothing  there 

but  love . And  clinging  heart  to  heart,  brother  and  sister  mingled 

holy  kisses,  and  strained  nearer  and  nearer  still,  as  if  to  satisfy  their 
last  lingering  doubts  of  each  other’s  kin. 

Many  a  minute  passed  in  silent  joy . Philammon  dare  not 

speak  ;  he  dare  not  ask  her  what  brought  her  hither, — dare  not  wake 
her  to  recollect  the  frightful  present  by  questions  of  the  past,  of  his 


S76 


HYPATIA.  ^ 


long-forgotten  parents,  tlieir  home,  her  history . And,  after  all, 

was  it  not  enough  for  him  that  he  held  her  at  last  ? — her,  there  hy 
her  own  will, — the  lost  lamb  returned  to  him  ? — and  their  tears  min¬ 
gled  as  tlieir  cheeks  were  pressed  together. 

At  last  she  spoke. 

“  I  ought  to  have  known  you, — I  believe  I  did  know  you  from  the 
first  day  !  When  they  mentioned  your  likeness  to  me,  my  heart  leaped 
up  within  me  ;  and  a  voice  whispered.  .  .  .but  I  would  not  hear  it  ! 
I  was  ashamed, — ashamed  to  acknowledge  my  brother,  for  whom  I 
had  sought  and  longed  for  years. .  .  .asliamed  to  think  that  I  had  a 
brother.  .  .  .Ah  God  !  and  ought  I  not  to  be  ashamed  ?” 

And  she  broke  from  him  again,  and  threw  herself  on  the  floor. 

“  Trample  upon  me  ;  curse  me  I — anything  but  part  me  from  him  !  ” 

Pliilammon  had  not  the  heart  to  answer  her  ;  but  he  made  an 
involuntary  gesture  of  sorrowful  dissent. 

“  No  !  Call  me  what  I  am  ! — what  he  called  me  just  now  ! — but 
do  not  take  me  away  !  Strike  me,  as  he  struck  me  ! — anything  but 
parting  !  ” 

“  Struck  you  ?  The  curse  of  God  be  on  him  !  ” 

“  Ah,'  do  not  curse  him  ! — not  him  !  It  was  not  a  blow,  indeed  ! — 
only  a  push, — a  touch, — and  it  was  my  fault, — all  mine  ;  I  angered 

him, — I  upbraided  him  ; — I  was  mad . O,  why  did  he  deceive  me? 

Why  did  he  let  me  dance  ? — command  me  to  dance  !  ” 

“  Command  you  ?  ” 

“  He  said  that  we  must  not  break  our  words.  He  would  not  hear 
me,  when  I  told  him  that  we  could  deny  having  promised.  I  said 

that  promises  made  over  the  wine  need  never  be  kept . Who  ever 

heard  of  keeping  them  ?  And  Orestes  was  drunk,  too.  But  he  said 

that  I  might  teach  a  Goth  to  be  what  1  liked,  except  a  liar . Was 

not  that  a  strange  speech  ?. . .  .And  W,ulf  bade  him  be  strong,  and 
blessed  him  for  it.” 

“  He  was  right,”  sobbed  Pliilammon. 

“  Then  I  thought  he  would  love  me  for  obeying  him,  though  I 
loathed  it  ! — 0  God,  how  I  loathed  it  !.  .  .  .But  how  could  I  fancy 
that  he  did  not  like  my  doing  it  ?  Who  ever  heard  of  any  one  doing  of 
their  own  will  what  they  did  not  like  ?  ” 

Pliilammon  sobbed  again,  as  the  poor  civilized  savage  artlessly 
opened  to  him  all  her  moral  darkness.  What  could  he  say  ?. . .  .He 
knew  what  to  say.  The  disease  ivas  so  utterly  patent,  that  any  of 
Cyril’s  school-children  could  have  supplied  the  remedy.  But  how  to 
speak  it  ? — how  to  tell  her,  before  all  things,  as  he  longed  to  do,  that 
there  was  no  hope  of  her  marrying  the  Amal,  and  therefore  no  peace 
for  her  till  she  left  him? 

“  Then  you  did  hate  the — the - ”  said  heat  last,  catching  at  some 

gleam  of  light. 

“  Hate  it  ?  Do  I  not  belong,  body  and  feoul,  to  him? — him  only  ? 
. , ,  .And  yet . I  must  tell  you  all  |  When  I  and  the  girls  began 


LOST  LAMBS. 


277 


to  practice,  all  tlie  old  feelings  came  back, — tlie  love  of  being  admired* 
and  applauded,  and  clieered  ;  and  dancing  is  so  delicious  ! — so  de¬ 
licious  to  feel  tliat  you  are  doing  anything  beautiful  perfectly,  and 
better  than  every  one  else  !.  .  .  .And  he  saw  that  I  liked  it,  and  de¬ 
spised  me  for  it. ....  And,  deceitful  ! — he  little  guessed  how  much  of 
the  pains  which  I  took  were  taken  to  please  him,  to  do  my  best  before 
him,  to  win  admiration,  only  that  I  might  take  it  home  and  throw  it 
all  at  his  beloved  feet,  and  make  the  world  say  once  more,  ‘  She  has 
all  Alexandria  to  worship  her,  and  yet  she  cares  for  that  one  Goth 
more  than  for — ’  But  he  deceived  me,  true  man  that  he  is  !  He 
wished  to  enjoy  my  smiles  to  the  last  moment,  and  then  to  cast  me 
otf,  when  I  had  once  given  him  an  excuse . Too  cowardly  to  up¬ 

braid  me,  he  let  me  ruin  myself,  to  save  him  the  trouble  of  ruining  me. 
O  men,  men  !  all  alike  !  They  love  us  for  their  own  sakes,  and  we 
love  them  for  love’s  sake.  We  live  by  love,  we  die  for  love,  and  yet 

we  never  find  it,  but  only  selfishness  dressed  up  in  love’s  mask . 

And  then  we  take  up  with  that,  poor,  fond,  self-blinded  creatures 
that  we  are  ! — and,  in  spite  of  the  poisoned  hearts  around  us,  persuade 
ourselves  that  our  latest  asp’s  egg,  at  least,  will  hatch  into  a  dove, 
and  that,  though  all  men  are  faithless,  our  own  tyrant  can  never 
change,  for  he  is  more  than  man  !  ” 

“  But  he  has  deceived  you  !  You  have  found  out  your  mistake. 
Leave  him,  then,  as  he  deserves  !  ” 

Pelagia  looked  up  with  something  of  a  tender  smile.  ‘  ‘  Poor  dar¬ 
ling  !  Little  do  you  know  of  love  !  ” 

Philammon,  utterly  bewildered  by  this  newest  and  strangest  phase 
of  human  passion,  could  only  gasp  out, — 

“  But  do  you  not  love  me,  too,  my  sister?” 

“  Do  I  not  love  you  ?  But  not  as  I  love  him  !  O  hush,  hush  ! — 
you  cannot  understand  yet  !  ”  And  Pelagia  hid  her  face  in  her  hands, 

while  convulsive  shudderings  ran  through  every  limb . 

“  I  must  do  it  !  I  must' !  I  will  dare  everything,  stoop  to  every¬ 
thing,  for  love’s  sake  !  Go  to  her  ! — to  the  wise  woman  ! — to  Hypa¬ 
tia  !  She  loves  you  !  I  know  that  she  loves  you  !  She  will  hear 
you,  though  she  will  not  me  !  ” 

“  Hypatia  ?  Do  you  not  know  that  she  was  sitting  there  unmoved 
at — in  the  theater  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  She  was  forced  ?  Orestes  compelled  her  !  Miriam  told  me  so. 
And  I  saw  it  in  her  face.  As  I  passed  beneath  her,  I  looked  up  ;  and 
she  was  as  pale  as  ivory,  trembling  in  every  limb.  There  was  a  dark 
hollow  round  her  eyes, — she  had  been  weeping,  I  saw.  And  I  sneered 
in  my  mad  self-conceit,  and  said,  ‘  She  looks  as  if  she  was  going  to 
be  crucified,  not  married  !’.  .  .But  now,  now  ! — 0,  go  to  her  !  Tell 
her  that  I  will  give  all  that  I  have, — jewels,  money,  dresses,  house  ! 
Tell  her  that  I — I — entreat  her  pardon,  that  I  will  crawl  to  her  feet 
myself  and  ask  it,  if  she  requires  ! — Only  let  her  teach  me, — teach 
jne  to  be  wise,  and  good,  and  honored,  and  respected,  as  she  is  !  Ask 


278 


UTPATIA. 


lier  to  tell  a  poor,  broken-liearted  woman  lier  secret.  Slie  can  make 
yold  Wnlf,  and  liim,  and  Orestes  even,  and  the  magistrates,  respect 
her . Ask  her  to  teach  me  hov’'  to  he  like  her,  and  to  make  him  re¬ 

spect  me  again,  and  I  will  give  her  all, — all !  ” 

Philammon  hesitated.  Something  within  warned  him,  'as  the 
Daemon  used  to  warn  Socrates,  that  his  errand  would  he  bootless.  He 
thought  of  the  theater,  and  of  that  firm,  compressed  lip  :  and  forgot 
the  hollow  eye  of  misery  which  accompanied  it  in  his  wrath  against 
his  lately-worshiped  idol, 

“  0,  go  !  go  !  I  tell  you,  it  was  against  her  will.  She  felt  for  me 
' — I  saw  it — O  God  ! — when  I  did  not  feel  for  myself  !  And  I  hated 
her,  because  she  seemed  to  despise  me  in  my  fool’s  triumph  !  She 
cannot  despise  me  now  in  my  misery.  . .  .Go  !  go  !  or  you  will  drive 
me  to  the  agony  of  going  myself.” 

There  was  but  one  thing  to  be  done, 

“  You  will  wait  then,  here  ?  You  will  not  leave  me  again?” 

“  Yes.  But  you  must  be  quick  !  If  he  finds  out  that  I  am  away, 

he  may  fancy . Ah,  heaven  !  let  him  kill  me,  but  never  let  him  be 

jealous  of  me  !  Go  now  !  this  moment  !  Take  this  as  an  earnest, — 
the  cestus  which  I  wore  there.  Horrid  thing  !  I  hate  the  sight 
of  it  !  But  I  brought  it  Avith  me  on  purpose,  or  I  would  liaAm  thrown 
it  into  the  canal.  There  ;  say  it  is  an  earnest — only  an  earnest — of 
what  I  will  give  her  !  ” 

In  ten  minutes  more  Philammon  was  in  Hypatia’s  hall.  The  house¬ 
hold  seemed  full  of  terror  and  disturbance  ;  the  hall  was  full  of  sol¬ 
diers.  At  last  Hypatia’s  favorite  maid  passed,  and  knew  him.  Her 
mistress  could  not  speak  with  any  one.  Where  was  Theon,  then  ? 
He,  too,  had  shut  himself  up.  Never  mind.  Philammon  must, 
would,  speak  with  him.  And  he  pleaded  so  passionately  and  so 
SAveetly,  that  the  soft-hearted  damsel,  unable  to  resist  so  handsome  a 
suppliant,  undertook  his  errand,  and  led  him  up  to  the  library,  where 
Theon,  pale  as  death,  was  pacing  to  and  fro,  apparently  h&,lf  beside 
himself  with  terror. 

Philammon’s  breathless  message  fell  at  first  upon  unheeding  ears. 

‘  A  new  pupil,  sir  !  Is  this  a  time  for  pupils,  when  my  house,  my 
daughter’s  life,  is  not  safe?  Wretch  that  I  am  !  And  have  I  led  her 
into  the  snare  ?  I,  Avith  my  vain  ambition  and  covetousness  !  0  my 

child  !  my  child  J  my  one  treasure  !  O  the  double  curse  which  Avill 
light  upon  me,  if - ” 

“  She  asks  for  but  one  interview.” 

‘  With  my  daughter,  sir?  Pelagia?  Will  you  insult  me?  Do 
you  suppose,  even  if  her  own  pity  should  so  far  tempt  her  to  degrade 
herself,  that  I  could  allow  her  so  to  contaminate  her  purity  ?  ” 

“  Your  terror,  sir,  excuses  your  rudeness.” 

‘  ‘  Rudeness,  sir  ?  The  rudeness  lies  in  your  intruding  on  us  at 
such  a  moment?” 

“  Then  this,  perhaps,  may,  in  your  eyes  at  least,  excuse  me  in  my 


LOST  LAMBS. 


279 


turn.”  And  Philammon  held  out  the  cestus.  “  You  are  a  better- 
judge  of  its  value  than  I.  But. I  am  commissioned  to  say,  that  it  is 
only  an  earnest  of  what  she  will  give  willingly  and  at  once,  even  to 
the  half  of  her  wealth,  for  the  honor  of  becoming  your  daughter’s 
pupil.”*  And  he  laid  the  jeweled  girdle  on  the  table. 

The  old  man  halted  in  his  walk.  The  emeralds  and  pearls  shone 
like  the  galaxy.  He  looked  at  them  ;  and  walked  on  again  more 

slowly . What  might  be  their  value  ?  What  might  it  not  be  ? 

At  least,  they  would  pay  all  his  debts . And  after  hovering  to 

and  fro  for  another  minute  before  the  bait,  he  turned  to  Pliilammon. 
“  If  you  would  promise  to  mention  the  thing  to  no  one - ” 

“  I  will  promise.” 

“And  in  case  my  daughter,  as  I  have  a  right  to  expect,  shall  re¬ 
fuse  - ” 

“  Let  her  keep  the  jewels.  Their  owner  has  learned,  thank  God,  to 
despise  and  hate  them  !  Let  her  keep  the  jewels — and  my  curse  ! 
For  God  do  so  to  me,  and  more  also,  if  I  ever  see  her  face  again  !  ” 

The  old  man  had  not  heard  the  latter  part  of  Philammon’s  speech. 
He  had  seized  his  bait  as  greedily  as  a  crocodile,  and  hurried  off 
with  it  into  Hypatia’s  chamber,  while  Pliilammon  stood  expectant, ' 
possessed  witlr  a  new  and  fearful  doubt.  ‘  ‘  Degrade  herself  !  ” 
“  Contaminate  her  purity  !  ”  If  that  notion  were  to  be  the  fruit 
of  all  her  philosophy  ?  If  selfishness,  pride,  Pharisaism,  were  all 
its  outcome?  Why, — had  they  not  been  its  outcome  already?  When 
had  he  seen  her  helping,  even  j^itying,  the  poor,  the  outcast  ?  When 
had  he  heard  from  her  one  word  of  real  sympathy  for  the  sorrowing, 
for  the  sinful!....  He  was  still  lost  in  thought  when  Theon  re¬ 
entered,  bringing  a  letter. 

“  From  Hypatia  to  her  well-beloved  pupil. 

“  I  pity  you, — how  should  I  not  ?  And  more,  I  thank  you  for  this 
your  request,  for  it  shows  me  that  my  unwilling  presence  at  the 
hideous  pageant  of  to-day  has  not  alienated  from  me  a  soul  of  which 
I  had  cherished  the  noblest  hopes,  for  which  I  had  sketched  out  the 
loftiest  destiny.  But — how  shall  I  say  it  ?  Ask  yourself  whether 
a  change — apparently  impossible — must  not  take  place  in  her  for 
whom  you  plead,  before  she  and  I  can  meet  ?  I  am  not  so  inhuman 
as  to  blame  you  for  having  asked  me  ;  I  do  not  blame  her  for  being 
what  she  is.  She  does  but  follow  her  nature  ;  who  can  be  angry 
with  her,  if  destiny  have  informed  so  fair  an  animal  with  a  too  gross 
and  earthly  spirit?  Why  weep  over  her?  Dust  she  is,  and  unto 
dust  she  will  return  ;  while  you,  to  whom  a  more  divine  spark  was 
alloted  at  your  birth,  must  rise,  and,  unrepining,  leave  below  you  one 
only  connected  with  you  by  the  unreal  and  fleeting  bonds  of 
fleshly  kin.” 

Pliilammon  crushed  the  letter  together  in  his  hand,  and  strode 
from  the  house  without  a  word. 

The  philosopher  had  ixo  gospel,  then,  for  the  harlot  1  no  word  for 


280 


HYPATIA. 


the  sinner,  the  degraded  !  Destiny,  forsooth  !  She  was  to  follow  hei 
destiny,  and  be  base,  miserable,  self-condemned.  She  was  to  crush 
the  voice  of  conscience  and  reason,  as  often  as  it  awoke  within  her, 
and  compel  herself  to  believe  that  she  was  bound  to  be  that  which  she 
knew  herself  bound  not  to  be.  She  was  to  shut  her  eyes  to  that 
present  palpable  misery  which  was  preaching  to  her,  with  the  voice 
of  God  himself,  that  the  wages  of  sin  are  death.  Dust  she  was,  and 
unto  dust  she  will  return  !  0  glorious  hope  for  her,  for  him,  who 

felt  as  if  an  eternity  of  bliss  would  be  worthless,  if  it  parted  him 
from  his  new-found  treasure  !  Dust  she  was,  and  unto  dust  she 
must  return  ! 

Hapless  Hypatia  !  If  she  must  needs  misapply,  after  the  fashion 
of  her  school,  a  text  or  tw’’o  here  and  there  from  the  Hebrew  Scrip¬ 
tures,  what  suicidal  fantasy  set  her  on  quoting  that  one?  For  now 
upon  Phil  amnion’s  memory  flashed  up,  in  letters  of  light,  old  words 
forgotten  for  months, — and  ere  he  was  aware,  he  found  himself  re¬ 
peating  aloud  and  passionately,  ‘‘I  believe  in  the  forgiveness  of  sins, 
the  resurrection  of  the  body,  and  the  life  everlasting,”.  .  .  .and  then 
clear  and  fair  arose  before  him  the  vision  of  the  God-man,  as  He  lay 
at  meat  in  the  Pharisee’s  house  ;  and  of  her  who  washed  His  feet 

with  tears,  and  wiped  them  with  the  hairs  of  her  head . And  from 

the  depths  of  his  agonized  heart  arose  the  prayer,  “Blessed  Magda¬ 
lene,  intercede  for  her  !  ” 

So  high  he  could  rise  :  but  not  beyond.  For  the  notion  of  that 
God -man  was  receding  fast  to  more  and  more  awful  and  abysmal 
heights,  in  the  minds  of  a  generation  who  were  forgetting  His  love 
in  His  power,  and  practically  losing  sight  of  His  humanity  in  their 
eager  doctrinal  assertion  of  His  Divinity.  And  Philammon’s  heart 
re-echoed  the  spirit  of  his  age,  when  he  felt  that  for  an  apostate  like 
himself  it  were  presumptuous  to  entreat  for  any  light  or  help  from 
the  fountain-head  itself.  He  who  had  denied  his  Lord,  he  who  had 
voluntarily  cut  himself  off  from  the  communion  of  the  Catholic 
Church, — how  could  he  restore  himself  ?  How  could  he  appease  the 
wrath  of  Him  who  died  on  the  cross,  save  by  years  of  bitter  supplica¬ 
tion  and  self- punishment  ? . 

“  Fool  !  Vain  and  ambitious  fool  that  I  have  been  !  For  this  I 
threw  away  the  faith  of  my  childhood  !  For  this  I  listened  to  words 
at  which  I  shuddered  ;  crushed  down  my  own  doubts  and  disgusts  ; 
tried  to  persuade  myself  that  I  could  reconcile  them  with  Christianity, 
— that  I  could  make  a  lie  flt  into  the  truth  !  For  this  I .  puffed  my¬ 
self  up  in  the  vain  hope  of  becoming  not  as  other  men  are, — superior, 
forsooth,  to  my  kind  !  It  was  not  enough  for  me  to  be  a  man  made 
in  the  image  of  God  :  but  I  must  needs  become  a  god  myself,  know¬ 
ing  good  and  evil.  And  here  is  the  end  !  I  call  upon  my  flne  phil-i 
osophy  to  help  me  once,  in  one  real  practical  human  struggle,  and  it 
folds  its  arms  and  sits  serene  and  silent,  smiling  upon  my  misery  t 
0  fool,  fool,  thou  art  filled  with  the  fruit  of  th^  own  devices  !  Back 


/ 


LOST  lambs.  281 

to  tlie  old  faitli !  Home  again,  thou  wanderer  !  And  yet  how  home  ? 

Are  not  the  gates  shut  against  me  ?  Perhaps  against  her  too . 

What  if  she,  like  me,  were  a  baptized  Christian  ?  ” 

Terrible  and  all  but  hopeless  that  thought  flashed  across  him,  as  in 
the  first  revulsion  of  his  conscience  he  plunged  utterly  and  implicitly 
back  again  into  the  faith  of  his  childhood,  and  all  the  dark  and  cruel 
theories  popular  in  his  day  rose  up  before  him  in  all  their  terrors. 
In  the  innocent  simplicity  of  the  Laura,  he  had  never  felt  their 
force  ;  but  he  felt  them  now.  If  Pelagia  were  a  baptized  woman, 
what  was  before  her  but  unceasing  penance?  Before  her,  as  before 
him,  a  life  of  cold  and  hunger,  groans^  and  tears,  loneliness  and 
hideous,  soul -sickening  uncertainty.  Life  was  a  dungeon  for  them 
both  henceforth.  Be  it  so  !  There  was  nothing  else  to  believe  in. 
No  other  rock  of  hope  in  earth  or  heaven.  That  at  least  promised  a 
possibility  of  forgiveness,  of  amendment,  of  virtue,  of  reward, — ay,, 
of  everlasting  bliss  and  glory  :  and  even  if  she  missed  of  that,  better 
for  her  the  cell  in  the  desert  than  a  life  of  self-contented  impurity  ! 
If  that  latter  were  her  destiny,  as  Hypatia  said,  she  should  at  least 
die  fighting  against  it,  defying  it,  cursing  it  !  Better  virtue  with  hell, 
than  sin  with  heaven  !  And  Hypatia  had  not  even  promised  her  a 
heaven.  The  resurrection  of  the  flesh  was  too  carnal  a  notion  for 
her  refined  and  lofty  creed.  And  so,  his  four  months’  dream  swept 
away  in  a  moment,  he  hurried  back  to  his  chamber,  with  one  fixed 
thought  before  him, — the  desert  ;  a  cell  for  Pelagia  ;  another  for 
himself.  There  they  would  repent,  and  pray,  and  mourn  out  life 
side  by  side,  if  perhaps  God  would  have  mercy  upon  their  souls. 
Yet — perhaps  she  might  not  have  been  baptized  after  all.  And  then 
she  was  safe.  Like  other  converts  from  Paganism,  she  might  become 
a  catechumen,  and  go  on  to  baptism,  where  the  mystic  water  would 
wash  away  the  past,  and  she  would  begin  life  afresh,  in  the  spotless 
robes  of  innocence.  Yet  he  had  been  baptized,  he  knew  from 
Arsenins,  before  he  left  Athens  ;  and  she  was  older  than  he.  It  was 
all  but  impossible,  yet  he  would  hope  ;  and  breathless  with  anxiety 
and  excitement,  he  ran  up  the  narrow  stairs  and  found  Miriam 
standing  outside,  her  hand  upon  the  bolt,  apparently  inclined  to  dis¬ 
pute  his  passage. 

“  Is  she  still  within?” 

What  if  she  be  ?  ” 

‘‘Let  me  pass  into  my  own  room.” 

“Yours?  Who  has  been  paying  the  rent  for  you,  these  four 
months  past  ?  You  ?  What  can  you  say  to  her  ?  What  can  you  do 
for  her  ?  Young  pedant,  you  must  be  in  love  yourself  before  you  can 
help  poor  creatures  who  are  in  love  !  ” 

But  Philammon  pushed  past  her  so  fiercely,  that  the  old  woman 
was  forced  to  give  way,  and  with  a  sinister  smile  she  followed  him 
into  the  chamber. 

Pelagia  sprung  toward  her  brother. 


^8^  HYPATIA. 

“  Will  slie  ? — will  slie  see  me 

“  Let  us  talk  no  more  of  her,  my  beloved,”  said  Philammon,  lay¬ 
ing  his  hand  gently  on  her  trembling  shoulders,  and  looking  earnestly 
into  her  eyes . ‘  ‘  Better  that  we  two  should  work  out  our  deliver¬ 

ance  for  ourselves,  without  the  help  of  strangers.  You  can  trust 
me  ?  ” 

“You ?  And  can  you  help  me ?  Will  you  teach  me ? ” 

“Yes,  but  not  here . We  must  escape. — :Nay,  hear  me,  one 

moment  !  dearest  sister,  hear  me  !  Are  you  so  happy  here  that  you 
can  conceive  of  no  better  place  !  And — and,  0  God  !  that  it  may  not 
be  true  after  all  ! — but  is  there  not  a  hell  hereafter  ?  ” 

Pelagia  covered  her  face  with  her  hands  : — ‘  ‘  The  old  monk  warned 
me  of  it  !  ” 

“0,  take  his  warning  And  Philammon  was  bursting  forth 

with  some  such  words  about  the  lake  of  fire  and  brimstone  as  he  had 
been  accustomed  to  hear  from  Pambo  and  Arsenius,  when  Pelagia  in¬ 
terrupted  him, — 

“0  Miriam!  Is  it  true?  Is  it  possible?  What  will  become  of " 
me  ?  ”  almost  shrieked  the  poor  child. 

“  What  if  it  were  true  ? — Let  him  tell  you  how  he  will  save  you  . 
from  it,”  answered  Miriam,  quietly. 

‘  ‘  Will  not  the  Gospel  save  her  from  it,  unbelieving  Jew  ?  Do  not 
contradict  me  1  I  can  save  her.” 

“'If  she  does  what  ?” 

“  Can  she  not  repent  I  Can  she  not  mortify  these  base  affections  ? 
Can  she  not  be  forgiven  I  O  my  Pelagia  1  forgive  me  for  having 
dreamed  one  moment  that  I  could  make  you  a  philosopher,  when 
you  may  be  a  saint  of  God,  a - ” 

He  stopped  short  suddenly,  as  the  thought  about  baptism  flashed 
across  him,  and  in  a  faltering  voice  asked,  “  Are  you  baptized?  ” 

“  Baptized  ?”  asked  she,  hardly  understanding  the  term. 

“  Yes,  by  the  bishop, — in  the  church.” 

“  Ah,”  she  said,  “  I  remember  now . When  I  was  four  or  five 

years  old . A  tank,  and  women  undressing . And  I  was  bathed 

too,  and  an  old  man  dipped  my  head  under  the  Avater  three  times . 

I  have  forgotten  what  it  all  meant, — it  was  so  long  ago.  I  wore  a 
white  dress,  I  know,  afterwards.” 

Philammon  recoiled  with  a  groan. 

“  Unhappy  child  !  May  God  have  mercy  on  you  1  ” 

“  Will  he  not  forgive  me,  then?  You  have  forgiven  me.  He? — 
he  must  be  more  good  even  than  you. — Why  not  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  He  forgave  you  then,  freely,  when  you  were  baptized  ;  and  there 
is  no  second  pardon,  unless - ” 

“  Unless  I  leave  my  love  1  ”  shrieked  Pelagia. 

“  When  the  Lord  forgave  tlie  blessed  Magdalene  freely,  and*  told 
her  that  her  faith  had  saved  her,  did  she  live  on  in  sin,  or  even  in 
the  pleasures  of  this  world  ?  No  !  though  God  had  forgiven  her,  sh« 


I 


LOBT  LAMBS. 


^83 


could  not  forgive  lierself.  She  fled  forth  into  the  desert^  and  there, 
naked  and  barefoot,  clothed  only  with  her  hair,  and  feeding  on  the 
herb  of  the  field,  she  stayed  fasting  and  praying  till  her  dying  day, 
never  seeing  the  face  of  man,  but  visited  and  comforted  by  angels  and 
archangels.  And  if  she,  she  who  never  fell  again,  needed  that  long 
penance  to  work  out  her  own  salvation, — O  Pelagia,  what  will  not 
Grod  require  of  you,  who  have  broken  your  baptismal  vows,  and  de¬ 
filed  the  white  robes,  which  the  tears  of  penance  only  can  wash  clean 
once  more  ?  ” 

“But  I  did  not  know  !  I  did  not  ask  to  be  baptized  !  Cruel,  cruel 
parents,  to  bring  me  to  it  !  And  God  !  0,  why  did  He  forgive  me  so 
soon  ?  And  to  go  into  the  deserts  !  I  dare  not !  I  cannot  !  See  me, 
how  delicate  and  tender  I  am  !  I  should  die  of  hunger  and  cold  !  I 
should  go  mad  with  fear  and  loneliness  !  O  brother,  brother!  is  this 
the  Gospel  of  the  Christians  !  I  came  to  you  to  be  taught  how  to  be 
wise,  and  good,  and  respected,  and  you  tell  me  that  all  I  can  do  is  to 
live  this  horrible  life  of  torture  here,  on  the  chance  of  escaping  tor¬ 
ture  forever  !  And  how  do  I  know  that  I  shall  escape  it  ?  How  do 
I  know  that  I  shall  make  myself  miserable  enough  ?  How  do  I  know 
that  He  will  forgive  me  after  all  ?  Is  this  true,  Miriam  !  Tell  me, 
or  I  shall  go  mad  !  ’’ 

“Yes,”  said  Miriam,  with  a  quiet  sneer.  “This  is  the  Gospel 
and  good  news  of  salvation,  according  to  the  doctrine  of  the  Naza- 
renes.” 

‘  ‘  I  will  go  "with  you  !  ”  cried  Philammon.  ‘  ‘  I  will  go  !  I  will 
never  leave  you  i  I  have  my  own  sins  to  wash  away  ! — Happy  for 
me  if  I  ever  do  it  ! — And  I  will  build  you  a  cell  near  mine,  and  kind 
men  will  teach  us,  and  we  will  pray  together  night  and  morning,  for 
ourselves  and  for  each  other,  and  weep  out  our  weary  lives  to¬ 
gether - ” 

“  Better  end  them  here,  at  once  !  ”  said  Pelagia,  with  a  gesture  of 
despair,  and  dashed  herself  down  on  the  floor. 

Philammon  was  about  to  lift  her  up,  when  Miriam  caught  him  by 
the  arm,  and  in  a  hurried  whisper, — ’“Are  you  mad?  Will  you 
ruin  your  own  purpose  ?  Why  did  you  tell  her  this  ?  Why  did  you 
not  wait, — give  her  hope, — time  to  collect  herself, — time  to  wean 
herself  from  her  lover,  instead  of  terrifying  and  disgusting  her  at 
the  outset,  as  you  have  done?  Have  you  a  man’s  heart  in  you  ?  No 
word  of  comfort  for  that  poor  creature,  nothing  but  hell,  hell,  hell  ! 
— See  to  your  own  chance  of  hell  first  !  It  is  greater  than  you 
fancy  !  ” 

‘  ‘  It  cannot  be  greater  than  I  fancy  !  ” 

“Then  see  to  it  I  For  her,  poor  darling! — why,  even  we  Jews, 
who  know  that  all  you  Gentiles  are  doomed  to  Gehenna  alike,  have 
some  sort  of  hope  for  such  a  poor,  untaught  creature  as  that.” 

“  And  why  is  she  untaught?  Wretch  that  you  are  !  You  have 
had  the  training  of  her  I  You  brought  her  up  to  sin  and  shame  I 


,•  'V 

m 


htpatiA, 


You  drove  from  her  recollection  the  faith  in  which  she  was  hap 
tized  !  ” 

“  So  much  the  better  for  her,  if  the  recollection  of  it  is  to  make 
her  no  happier  than  it  does  already.  Better  to  wake  unexpectedly 
in  Gehenna  when  you  die,  than  to  endure  over  and  above  the  dread 
of  it  here.  And  as  for  leaving  her  untaught,  on  your  own  showing 
she  has  been  taught  too  much  already.  Wiser  it  would  be  in  you  to 
curse  your  parents  for  having  had  her  baptized,  than  me  for  giving 
her  ten  years’  pleasure  before  she  goes  to  the  pit  of  Topliet.  Come, 
now,  don’t  be  angry  with  me.  The  old  Jewess  is  your  friend,  revile 
her  as  you  will.  She  shall  marry  this  Goth.” 

‘  ‘  An  Arian  heretic  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  She  shall  convert  him  and  make  a  Catholic  of  him,  if  you  like. 
At  all  events,  if  you  wish  to  win  lier,  you  must  win  her  my  way. 
You  have  had  your  chance,  and  spoiled  it.  Let  me  have  mine. 
Pelagia,  darling  !  Up,  and  be  a  woman  !  We  will  find  a  philter 
down-stairs  to  give  that  ungrateful  man,  that  shall  make  him  more 
mad  about  you,  before  a  day  is  over,  than  ever  you  were  about  him  !  ” 

“No!”  said  Pelagia,  looking  up.  “No  love-potions  I  No  poi¬ 
sons  !  ” 

“Poisons,  little  fool  !  Do  you  doubt  the  old  woman’s  skill?  Do 
you  think  I  shall  make  him  lose  his  wits,  as  Callisphyra  did  to  her 
lover  last  year,  because  she  would  trust  to  old  Megaera’s  drugs,  in¬ 
stead  of  coming  to  me  ?  ” 

“No  I  No  drugs  ;  no  niagic  1  He  must  love  me  really,  or  not  at 
all  I  He  must  love  me  for  myself,  because  I  am  worth  loving,  be¬ 
cause  he  honors,  worships  me, — or  let  me  die  I  I  whose  boast  was, 
even  when  I  was  basest,  that  I  never  needed  such  mean  tricks,  but 
conquered  like  Aphrodite,  a  queen  in  my  own  right  !  I  have  been 
tny  own  love-charm  ;  when  I  cease  to  be  that,  let  me  die  !  ” 

“  One  as  mad  as  the  other  !  ”  cried  Miriam,  in  utter  perplexity. 

‘  Hist  !  what  is  that  tramp  upon  the  stairs  ?  ” 

At  this  moment  heavy  footsteps  were  heard  ascending  the  stairs. 

.  .  .All  three  stox^ped  aghast  :  Philammon,  because  he  thought  the 
dsitors  were  monks  in  search  of  him  ;  Miriam,  because  she  thought 
.  hey  were  Orestes’s  guards  in  search  of  her  ;  and  Pelagia,  from  vague 
dread  of  anything  and  everything . 

“  Have  you  an  inner  room  ?”  asked  the  Jewess. 

“  None.” 

The  old  woman  set  her  lij^s  firmly,  and  drew  her  dagger.  Pelagia 
wrapped  her  face  in  her  cloak,  and  stood  trembling,  bowed  down,  as 
if  expecting  another  blow.  The  door  opened,  and  in  walked,  neither 
monks  nor  guards,  but  Wulf  and  Smid. 

“  Heyday,  young  monk  1  ”  cried  the  latter  worthy,  with  a  loud 
laugh.  “Veils  here,  too,  eh?  At  your  old  trade,  my  worthy 
portress  of  hell-gate  ?  Well,  walk  out  now  ;  we  have  a  little  business 
with  this  young  gentleman.” 


LOST  LAMBS.  285 

And,  slipping  past  the  unsuspecting  Goths,  Pelagia  and  Miriam 
hurried  down-stairs. 

“  The  young  one,  at  least,  seems  a  little  ashamed  of  her  errand. 
. . .  .Now,  Wulf,  speak  low  ;  and  I  will  see  that  no  one  is  listening  at 
the  door.” 

Philammon  faced  his  unexpected  visitors  with  a  look  of  angry 
inquiry.  What  right  had  they,  or  any  man,  to  intrude  at  such  a 
moment  on  his  misery  and  disgrace?. . .  .But  he  was  disarmed  the 
next  instant  hyoid  Wulf,  who  advanced  to  him,  and,  looking  him 
fully  in  the  face  with  an  expression  which  there  was  no  mistaking, 
held  out  his  broad  brown  hand. 

Philammon  grasped  it,  and  then,  covering  his  face  with  his  hands, 
burst  into  tears. 

“  You  did  right.  You  are  a  brave  boy.  If  you  had  died,  no  man 
need  have  been  ashamed  to  die  your  death.” 

‘  ‘  You  were  there,  then  ?  ”  sobbed  Philammon. 

We  were.” 

“  And  what  is  more,”  said  Smid,  as  the  poor  boy  writhed  at  the 
admission,  “  we  were  mightily  minded,  some  of  us,  to  have  leaped 
down  to  you  and  cut  you  a  passage  out.  One  man  at  least,  whom  I 
know  of,  felt  his  old  blood  as  hot  for  the  minute  as  a  four-year-old’s. 
The  foul  curs  !  And  to  hoot  her,  after  all  !  0  that  I  may  have  one 

good  hour’s  hewing  at  them  before  I  die  !  ” 

“  And  you  shall  !  ”  said  Wulf.  “  Boy,  you  wish  to  get  this  sister 
of  yours  into  your  power  ?  ” 

“  It  is  hopeless, — hopeless  !  She  will  never  leave  her — the  Amal.” 

“  Are  you  so  sure  of  that  ?  ” 

'  ‘‘  She  told  me  so  with  her  own  lips  not  ten  minutes  ago.  That  was 
she  who  went  out  as  you  entered  !  ” 

A  curse  of  astonishment  and  regret  burst  from  Smid . 

“  Had  I  but  known  her  !  By  the  soul  of  my  fathers,  she  should 
have  found  that  it  was  easier  to  come  here  than  to  go  home  again  !  ” 

“  Hush,  Smid  !  Better  as  it  is.  Boy,  if  I  put  her  into  your  power, 
dare  you  carry  her  off  ?  ” 

Philammon  hesitated  one  moment. 

“  What  I  dare,  you  know  already.  But  it  would  be  an  unlawful 
thing,  surely,  to  use  violence.” 

Settle  your  philosopher’s  doubts  for  yourself.  I  have  made  my 
offer.  I  should  have  thought  that  a  man  in  his  senses  could  give  but 
one  answer,  much  more  a  mad  monk.” 

“  You  forget  the  money  matters,  prince,”  said  Smid,  with  a  smile. 

I  do  not.  But  I  don’t  think  the  bov  so  mean  as  to  hesitate  on  that 
account.” 

He  may  as  well  know,  however,  that  we  promise  to  send  all  her 
trumpery  after  her,  even  to  the  Amal’s  presents.  As  for  the  house, 
we  won’t  trouble  her  to  lend  it  us  longer  than  we  can  help.  We 
intend  shortly  to  move  into  more  extensive  premises,  and  open  business 
on  a  grander  scale,  as  these  shopkeepers  say— eh,  prince  ?  ” 


286 


HYPATIA. 


“Her  money? — That  money  ?  God  forgive  her  !”  answered  Phil- 
ammon.  “  Do  you  fancy  me  base  enough  to  touch  it  ?  But  I  am  re¬ 
solved.  Tell  me  what  to  do,  and  I  will  do  it.” 

“  You  know  the  lane  which  runs  down  to  the  canal,  under  the  left 
wall  of  the  house  ?  ” 

“  Yes.” 

“  And  a  door  in  the  corner  tower,  close  to  the  landing-place?  ” 

“Ido.” 

“Be  there,  with  a  dozen  stout  monks,  to-morrow,  an  hour  after 
sundown,  and  take  what  we  give  you.  After  that,  the  concern  is 
yours,  not  ours.” 

“  Monks  ?  ”  said  Philammon.  “  I  am  at  open  feud  with  the  whole 
order.” 

“  Make  friends  with  them,  then,”  shortly  suggested  Smid. 

Philammon  writhed  inwardly.  “It  makes  no  difference  to  you,  I 
presume,  whom  I  bring  ?  ” 

“  No  more  than  it  does  whether  or  not  you  pitch  her  into  the  canal, 
and  put  a  hurdle  over  her  when  you  have  got  her,”  answered  Smid  ; 
“  which  is  what  a  Goth  would  do,  if  he  were  in  your  place.” 

“  Do  not  vex  the  poor  lad,  friend.  If  he  thinks  he  can  mend  her, 
instead  of  punishing  her,  in  Freya’s  name,  let  him  try.  You  will  be 
there,  then  ?  And  mind,  I  like  you.  I  liked  you  when  you  faced 
that  great  river-hog.  I  like  you  better  now  than  ever  ;  for  you  have 
spoken  to-day  like  a  Sagaman,  and  dared  like  a  hero.  Therefore 
mind  ;  if  you  do  not  bring  a  good  guard  to-morrow  night,  your  life 
will  not  be  safe.  The  whole  city  is  out  in  the  streets  ;  and  Odin  alone 
knows  what  will  be  done,  and  who  will  be  alive,  eight-and-forty 
hours  hence.  Mind  you  ! — The  mob  may  do  strange  things,  and  they 
may  see  still  stranger  things  done.  If  you  once  find  yourself  safe 
back  here,  stay  where  you  are,  if  you  value  her  life  or  your  own. 
And,  if  you  are  wise,  let  the  men  whom  you  bring  with  you  be  monks, 
though  it  cost  your  proud  stomach - ” 

“  That’s  not  fair,  prince  !  You  are  telling  too  much  !  ”  interrupted 
Smid  ;  while  Philammon  gulped  down  the  said  proud  stomach,  and 
answered,  “  Be  it  so  !  ” 

“  I  have  won  my  bet,  Smid,”  said  the  old  man,  chuckling  as  the 
two  tramped  out  into  the  street,  to  the  surprise  and  fear  of  all  the 
neighbors,  while  the  children  clapped  their  hands,  and  the  street- 
dogs  felt  it  their  duty  to  bark  lustily  at  the  strange  figures  of  their 
unwonted  visitors. 

“No  play,  no  pay,  Wulf.  We  shall  see  to-morrow.” 

‘  ‘  I  knew  that  he  would  stand  the  trial  !  I  knew  he  was  right  at 
heart  !  ” 

“  At  all  events,  there  is  no  fear  of  his  ill-using  the  poor  thing,  if 
he  loves  her  well  enough  to  go  down  on  his  knees  to  his  sworn  foes 
for  her.” 

“I  don’t  know  that,”  answered  Wulf,  with  a  shake  of  the  head. 


LOST  LAMBS. 


287 


*  These  monks,  I  hear,  fancy  that  their  God  likes  them  the  better  the 
more  miserable  they  are  :  so  perhaps  they  may  fancy  that  he  will  like 
them  all  the  more,  the  more  miserable  they  make  other  people.  How¬ 
ever,  it’s  no  concern  of  ours.” 

“We  have  quite  enough  of  our  own  to  see  to  just  now.  But  mind, 
no  play,  no  pay.” 

“  Of  course  not.  How  the  streets  are  filling  !  We  shall  not  be 
able  to  see  the  guards  to-night,  if  this  mob  thickens  much  more.” 

“  We  shall  have  enough  to  do  to  hold  our  own,  perhaps.  Do 
you  hear  what  they  are  crying  there  ?  ‘  Down  with  all  heathens  ! 

Down  with  barbarians  !  ’  That  means  us,  you  know.” 

“  Do  you  fancy  no  one  understands  Greek  but  yourself?  Let  them 

come . It  may  give  us  an  excuse . And  we  can  hold  the  house  a 

weelv.  ” 

‘  ‘  But  how  can  we  get  speech  of  the  guards  ?  ” 

“We  will  slip  round  by  water.  And  after  all,  deeds  will  win  them 
better  than  talk.  They  will  be  forced  to  fight  on  the  same  side  as 
we,  and  most  probably  be  glad  of  our  help  ;  for  if  the  mob  attacks 
any  one,  it  will  begin  with  the  prefect.” 

“And  then —  Curse  their  shouting!  Let  the  soldiers  once  find 
our  Amal  at  their  head,  and  they  will  be  ready  to  go  with  him  a  mile, 
where  they  meant  to  go  a  yard.” 

“  The  Goths  will,  and  the  Markmen,  and  those  Dacians,  and  Thra¬ 
cians,  or  whatever  the  Romans  call  them.  But  I  hardly  trust  the 
Huns.” 

“  The  curse  of  heaven  on  their  pudding  faces  and  pigs’  eyes  I 
There  will  be  no  love  lost  between  us.  But  there  are  not  twenty  of 
them  scattered  in  different  troops  ;  one  of  us  can  thrash  three  of 
them  ;  and  they  will  be  sure  to  side  with  the  winning  party.  Beside, 
plunder,  plunder,  comrade  1  When  did  you  know  a  Hun  turn  back 
from  that,  even  if  he  were  only  on  the  scent  of  a  lump  of  tallow?” 

“  As  for  the  Gauls  and  Latins,”. ..  .went  on  Wulf,  meditatively, 
“  they  belong  to  any  man  who  can  pay  them.” . 

“  Which  we  can  do,  like  all  wise  generals,  one  penny  out  of  our 
own  pocket,  and  nine  out  of  the  enemy’s.  And  the  Amal  is  stanch?” 

“  Stanch  as  his  own  hounds,  now  there  is  something  to  be  done  on 
the  spot.  His  heart  was  in  the  right  place  after  all.  I  knew  it  all 
along.  But  he  could  never  in  his  life  see  four-and-twenty  hours  be¬ 
fore  him.  Even  now,  if  that  Pelagia  gets  him  under  her  spell  again, 
he  may  throw  down  his  sword,  and  fall  as  fast  asleep  as  ever.” 

“Never  fear  :  we  have  settled  her  destiny  for  her,  as  far  as  that  is 
concerned.  Look  at  the  mob  before  the  door  !  We  must  get  in  by 
the  postern-gate.” 

‘  ‘  Get  in  by  the  sewer  like  a  rat !  •  I  go  my  own  way.  Draw,  old 
hammer  and  tongs  I  or  run  away  1  ” 

“Not  this  time.”  And  sword  in  hand,  the  two  marched  into  the 
heart  of  the  crowd,  who  gave  way  before  them  like  a  flock  of  sheep. 


288 


HYPATIA. 


“  They  know  tlieir  intended  shepherds  already,”  said  Smid.  But 
at  that  moment  the  crowd,  seeing  them  about  to  enter  the  house, 
raised  a  yell  of  “  Goths  !  Heathens  !  Barbarians  !  ”  and  a  rush  from 
behind  took  place. 

If  you  will  have  it,  then  1  ”  said  Wulf.  And  the  two  long,  bright 
blades  flashed  round  and  round  tlieir  heads,  redder  and  redder  every 

time  they  swung  aloft . The  old  men  never  even  checked  their 

steady  walk,  and  knocking  at  the  gate,  went  in,  leaving  more  than  one 
lifeless  corpse  at  the  entrance. 

“We  have  put  the  coal  in  the  thatch,  now,  with  a  vengeance,” 
said  Smid,  as  they  wiped  their  swords  inside. 

“We  have.  Get  me  out  a  boat  and  half  a  dozen  men,  and  I  .and 
Goderic  will  go  round  by  the  canal  to  the  palace,  and  settle  a  thing 
or  two  with  the  guards.” 

“  Why  should  not  the  Amal  go,  and  offer  our  help  himself  to  the 
prefect  ?  ” 

“  What  ?  Wculd  you  have  him  after  that  turn  against  the  hound  ? 
For  truth  and  honor’s  sake,  he  must  keep  quiet  in  the  matter.” 

“He  will  have  no  objection  to  keep  quiet, — trust  him  for  that  ! 
But  don’t  forget  Sa.gaman  Money-bag,  the  best  of  all  orators,”  called 
Smid  laughingly  afl,er  him,  as  he  went  off  to  man  the  boat. 


CHAPTER  XXV. 


* 

SEEKING  AFTER  A  SIGN. 

‘‘Wliat  answer  lias  lie  sent  back,  father?”  asked  Hypatia,  as 
Theon  re-entered  her  chamber,  after  delivering  that  hapless  letter  to 
Philammon. 

“  Insolent  that  he  is  !  he  tore  it  to  fragments,  and  fled  forth  with¬ 
out  a  word.” 

‘  ‘  Let  him  go,  and  desert  us  like  the  rest,  in  our  calamity  !  ” 

“  At  least  we  have  the  jewels.” 

“The  jewels?  Let  them  be  returned  to  their  owner.  Shall  we 
defile  ourselves  by  taking  them  as  wages  for  anything, — above  all, 
for  that  which  is  unperformed  ?  ” 

“But,  my  child,  they  were  given  to  us  freely.  He  bade  me  keep 
them  ;  and — and,  to  tell  you  the  truth,  I  must  keep  them.  After  this 
unfortunate  failure,  be  sure  of  it,  every  creditor  we  have  will  be 
clamoring  for  payment.” 

“Let  them  take  our  house  and  furniture,  and  sell  us  as  slaves, 
then.  Let  them  take  all,  provided  we  keep  our  virtue.” 

‘  ‘  Sell  us  as  slaves  ?  Ar«  you  mad  ?  ” 

“Not  quite  mad,  yet,  father,”  answered  she,  with  a  sad  smile. 
“But  how  should  we  be  worse  than  we  are  now,  were  we  slaves? 
Raphael  Aben-Ezra  told  me  that  he  obeyed  my  precepts,  when  he 
went  forth  as  a  houseless  beggar  ;  and  shall  I  not  have  courage  to 
obey  them  myself  if  the  need  come  ?  Tlie  thought  of  his  endurance 
has  shamed  my  luxury  for  this  many  a  month.  After  all,  what  does 
the  philosopher  require  but  bread  and  water,  and  the  clear  brook  in 
which  to  wash  away  the  stains  of  his  earthly  prison-house  ?  Let 
what  is  fated  come.  Hypatia  struggles  with  the  stream  no  more  !  ” 

“  My  daughter  !  And  have  you  given  up  all  hope?  So  soon  dis¬ 
heartened  !  What  !  is  this  paltry  accident  to  sweep  away  the  pur¬ 
poses  of  years?  Orestes  remains  still  faithful.  His  guards  have 
orders  to  garrison  the  house  for  as  long  as  we  shall  require  them.” 

“  Send  them  away,  then.  I  have  done  no  wrong,  and  I  fear  no 
punishment.” 

“  You  do  not  know  the  madness  of  the  mob  ;  they  are  shouting 
your  name  in  the  streets  already,  in  company  with  Pelagia’s.” 

Hypatia  shuddered.  Her  name  in  company  with  Pelagia’s  !  And 
to  this  she  had  brought  herself  ! 

“I  have  deserved  it  !  I  have  sold  myself  to  a  lie  and  a  disgrace  1 
HYPATIA— 10  C  389  ) 


^00 


HYPATIA. 


I  have  stooped  to  truckle,  to  intrigue  !  I  have  bound  myself  to  a  sot* 
did  trickster  !  Father  !  never  mention  his  name  to  me  again  !  1 

have  leagued  myself  with  the  impure  and  the  bloodthirsty,  and  I 
have  my  reward  !  No  more  politics  for  Hypatia  from  henceforth,  my 
father  ;  no  more  orations  and  lectures  ;  no  more  pearls  of  divine 
wisdom  cast  before  swine.  I  have  sinned  in  divulging  the  secrets  of 
the  Immortals  to  the  mob.  Let  them  follG^^v  their  natures  !  Fool 
that  I  was,  to  fancy  that  my  speech,  my  plots,  could  raise  them  above 
that  which  the  gods  had  made  them  !  ” 

‘\Then  you  give  up  our  lectures?  Worse  and  worse  !  W^^hall 
be  ruined  utterly  !  ” 

“We  are  ruined  utterly,  already.  Orestes?  There  is  no  help  in 
him.  I  know  the  man  too  well,  my  father,  not  to  know  that  he 
would  give  us  up  to-morrow  to  the  fury  of  the  Christians,  were  his 
own  base  life — even  his  own  baser  office — in  danger.” 

“  Too  true, — too  true  !  I  fear,”  said  the  poor  old  man,  wringing  his 
hands  in  perplexity.  “What  will  become  of  us, — of  you,  rather? 
What  matter  what  happens  to  the  useless  old  star-gazer?  Let  him 
die  !  To-day  or  next  year  is  alike  to  him.  But  you, — you  !  Let  us 
escape  by  the  canal.  We  may  gather  up  enough,  even  without  these 
jewels,  which  you  refuse,  to  pay  our  voyage  to  Athens,  and  there  we 
shall  be  safe  wuth  Plutarch  ;  he  will  welcome  you, — all  Athens  will 
welcome  you, — we  will  collect  a  fresh  school, — and  you  shall  be 
Queen  of  Athens,  as  you  have. been  Queen  of  Alexandria  !” 

“No,  father.  What  I  know,  henceforth  I  will  know  for  my¬ 
self  only.  Hypatia  will  be  from  this  day  alone  with  the  Immortal 
Cods  !  ” 

“  You  will  not  leave  me  ?  ”  cried  the  old  man,  terrified. 

“  Never  on  earth  !  ”  answered  she,  bursting  into  real  human  tears, 
and  throwing  herself  on  his  bosom.  “  Never, — never  !  father  of  my 
spirit  as  well  as  of  my  flesh  ! — the  parent  who  has  trained  me,  taught 
me,  educated  my  soul  from  the  cradle  to  use  her  wings  ! — the  only 
human  being  who  never  misunderstood  me, — never  thwarted  me, — 
never  deceived  me  !  ” 

“My  priceless  child!  And  I  have  been  the  cause  of  your 
ruin  1  ” 

“Not  you  1 — a  thousand  times  not  you  1  I  only  am  to  blame  !  I 
tampered  with  worldly  politics.  I  tempted  you  on  to  fancy  that  I 
jould  effect  what  I  so  rashly  undertook.  Do  not  accuse  yourself,  un¬ 
less  you  wish  to  break  my  heart  1  We  can  be  happy  together  yet. 
A  palm-leaf  hut  in  the  desert,  dates  from  the  grove,  and  water  from 
the  spring, — the  monk  dares  be  miserable  alone  in  such  a  dwelling, 
and  cannot  we  dare  to  be  happy  together  in  it  ?  ” 

“  Then  you  will  escape  ?  ” 

“Not  to-day.  It  were  base  to  flee  before  danger  comes.  We 
must  hold  out  at  our.  post  to  the  last  moment,  even  if  we  dare  not 
die  at  it  like  heroes.  And  to-morrow  I  go  to  the  lecture-room,  to  the 


SSJEIimG  AFTER  A  SIGN. 


^91 


beloved  Museum,  for  tlie  last  time,  to  take  farewell  of  my  pupils. 
Unworthy  as  they  are,  I  owe  it  to  myself  and  to  philosophy  to  tell 
them  why  I  leave  them,” 

“  It  will  be  too  dangerous, — indeed  it  will  !  ” 

“  I  could  take  the  guards  with  me,  then.  And  yet — no . They 

shall  never  have  occasion  to  impute  fear  to  the  philosopher.  Let 
them  see  her  go  forth  as  usual  on  her  errand,  strong  in  the  cour¬ 
age  of  innocence,  secure  in  the  protection  of  the  gods.  So,  per¬ 
haps,  some  sacred  awe,  some  suspicion  of  her  divineness,  may  fall  on 
them- at  last,” 

‘  ‘  I  must  go  with  you.  ” 

No,  I  go  alone.  You  might  incur  danger,  where  I  am  safe. 
After  all,  I  am  a  woman  . .  .and,  fierce  as  they  are,  they  will  not 
dare  to  harm  me.” 

The  old  mUn  shook  his  head. 

“  Look,  now,”  she  said,  smilingly  laying'  her  hands  on  his  shoul¬ 
ders,  and  looking  into  his  face . “  You  tell  me  that  I  am  beauti¬ 

ful,  you  know  ;  and  beauty  will  tame  the  lion.  Do  you  not  think 
that  this  face  might  disarm  even  a  monk  ?  ” 

And  she  laughed  and  blushed  so  sweetly,  that  the  old  man  forgot 
his  fears,  as  she  intended  that  he  should,  and  kissed  her,  and  went 
his  way  for  the  time  being,  to  command  all  manner  of  hospitalities 
to' the  soldiers,  whom  he  prudently  determined  to  keep  in  his  house 
as  long  as  he  could  make  them  stay  there  ;  in  pursuance  of  which 
wise  purpose,  he  contrived  not  to  see  a  great  deal  of  pleasant  flirta¬ 
tion  between  his  valiant  defenders  and  Hypatia’s  maids,  who,  by  no 
means  so  prudish  as  their  mistress,  welcomed  as  a  rare  boon  from 
heaven  an  afternoon’s  chat  with  twenty  tall  men  of  war. 

So  they  jested  and  laughed  below,  while  old  Theon,  having  brought 
out  the  very  best  old  wine,  and  actually  proposed  in  person,  by  way 
of  mending  matters,  the  health  of  the  Emperor  of  Africa,  locked 
himself  into  the  library,  and  comforted  his  troubled  soul  with  a 
tough  problem  of  astronomy,  which  had  been  haunting  him  the 
whole  day,  even  in  the  theater  itself.  But  Hypatia  sat  still  in  her 
chamber,  her  face  buried  in  her  hands,  her  heart  full  of  many 
thoughts,  her  eyes  of  tears.  She  had  smiled  away  her  father’s 
tears  :  she  could  not  smile  away  her  own. 

She  felt,  she  hardly  knew  why,  biit  she  felt  as  clearly  as  if  a  god 
had  proclaimed  it  to  her  bodily  ears,  that  the  crisis  of  her  life  was 
come  :  that  her  political  and  active  career  was  over,  and  that  she 
must  now  be  content  to  be  for  herself  and  in  herself  alone,  all  that 
she  was,  or  might  become.  The  world  might  be  regenerated  :  but 
not  in  her  day  ; — the  gods  restored  :  but  not  by  her.  It  was  a  fear¬ 
ful  discovery, — and  yet  hardly  a  discovery.  Her  heart  had  told  her 
for  years  that  she  was  hoping  against  hope, — that  she  was  struggling 
against  a  stream  too  mighty  for  her.  And  now  the  moment  had 
come  when  she  must  either  be  swept  helpless  down  the  current,  or, 


HYPATIA. 


by  one  desperate  effort,  win  firm  land,  and  let  the  tide  roll  on  its  own 

way  liencefortli . Its  own  way  ?...  .Not  the  way  of  the  gods,  at 

least ;  for  it  was  sweeping  their  names  from  off  the  earth.  What  if 
they  did  not  care  to  be  known  ?  What  if  they  were  weary  of  wor¬ 
ship  and  reverence  from  mortal  men,  and,  self-sufficing  in  their  own 
perfect  bliss,  recked  nothing  for  the  weal  or  woe  of  earth?  Must 
it  not  be  so  ?  Had  she  not  proof  of  it  in  everything  which  she  be¬ 
held  ?  What  did  Isis  care  for  her  Alexandria  ?  What  did  Athene 
care  for  her  Athens?. . .  .And  yet  Homer  and  Hesiod,  and  those  old 

Orphic  singers,  were  of  another  mind . Whence  got  they  that 

strange  fancy  of  gods  counseling,  warring,  intermarrying  with  man¬ 
kind,  as  with  some  kindred  tribe  ? 

^‘Zeus,  father  of  gods  and  men.”. ..  .Those  were  words  of  hope 

and  comfort . But  were  they  true  ?  Father  of  men  ?  Impossible  ! 

— not  father  of  Pelagia,  surely.  Not  father  of  the  base,  the  foul,  the 

ignorant . Father  of  heroic  souls,  only,  the  poets  must  have 

meant . But  where  were  the  heroic  souls  now?  Was  she  one? 

If  so,  why  was  she  deserted  by  the  upper  powers  in  her  utter  need  ? 
Was  the  heroic  race  indeed  extinct  ?  Was  she  merely  assuming,  in 
her  self-conceit,  an  honor  to  which  she  had  no  claim  ?  Or  was  it  all  a 
dream  of  those  old  singers?  Had  they,  as  some  bold  philosophers  had 
said,  invented  gods  in  their  own  likeness,  and  palmed  off  on  the  awe 
and  admiration  of  men  their  own  fair  phantoms  ?.  . .  .It  must  be  so. 
If  there  were  gods,  to  know  them  was  the  highest  bliss  of  man. 
Then  would  they  not  teach  men  of  themselves,  unveil  their  own  love¬ 
liness  to  a  chosen  few,  even  for  the  sake  of  their  own  honor  if  not, 
as  she  had  dreamed  once,  from  love  to  those  who  bore  a  kindred 
flame  to  theirs ?...  .What  if  there  were  no  gods?  What  if  the 
stream  of  fate,  which  was  sweeping  away  their  names,  were  the  only 
real  power  ?  What  if  that  old  Pyrrhonic  notion  were  the  true  solu¬ 
tion  of  the  problem  of  the  Universe  ?  What  if  there  were  no  center, 
no  order,  no  rest,  no  goal, — but  only  a  perpetual  flux,  a  down-rush¬ 
ing  cliange?  And  before  her  dizzying  brain  and  heart  arose  that 
awful  vision  of  Lucretius,  of  the  homeless  Universe,  falling,  falling, 
falling,  forever,  from  nowhence  toward  nowhither  through  the  unend- 
ingages,  by  causeless  and  unceasing  gravitation,  while  the  changes 
and  efforts  of  all  mortal  things  were  but  the  jostling  of  the  dust- 
atoms  amid  the  everlasting  storm . 

It  could  not  be  !  There  was  a  truth,  a  virtue,  a  beauty,  a  noble¬ 
ness,  which  could  never  change,  but  which  were  absolute,  the  same 
forever.  The  god-given  instinct  of  her  woman’s  heart  rebelled 

against  her  intellect,  and,  in  the  name  of  God,  denied  its  lie . Yes, 

there  was  virtue,  beauty . And,  yet — might  not  they,  too,  be  acci¬ 

dents  of  that  enchantment  which  man  calls  mortal  life  ;  temporary  and 
mutable  accidents  of  consciousness  ;  brilliant  sparks,,  struckoutby  the 
clashing  of  the  dust-atoms?  Who  could  tell? 

There  were  those  once  who  could  tell.  Did  not  Plotinus  speak  of 


MEKmG  AFTER  A  JSIO^. 


m 

a  direct  mystic  intuition  of  tlie  Deity,  an  entliusiasm  without  passion, 
a  still  intoxication  of  the  soul,  in  which  she  rose  above  life,  thought, 
reason,  herself,  to  that  which  she  contemplated,  the  absolute  and  first 
one,  and  united  herself  with  that  One,  or,  rather,  became  aware  of 
that  union  which  had  existed  from  the  first  moment  in  which  she 
emanated  from  the  One  ?  Six  times  in  a  life  of  sixty  years  had  Plo¬ 
tinus  risen  to  that  height  of  mystic  union,  and  known  himself  to  be 
a  part  of  God.  Once  had  Porphyry  attained  the  same  glory.  Hy¬ 
patia,  though  often  attempting,  had  never  yet  succeeded  in  attaining 
to  any  distinct  vision  of  a  being  external  to  herself,  though 
practice,  a  firm  will,  and  a  powerful  imagination  had  long  since  made 
her  an  adept  in  producing,  almost  at  will,  that  mysterious  *  trance 
which  was  the  preliminary  step  to  supernatural  vision.  But  her  de¬ 
light  in  the  brilliant,  and,  as  she  held,  divine  imaginations,  in  which 
at  such  times  she  reveled,  had  been  always  checked  and  chilled  by 
the  knowledge  that,  in  such  matters,  hundreds  inferior  to  her  in  in¬ 
tellect  and  in  learning — ay,  saddest  of  all,  Christian  monks  and  nuns 
— boasted  themselves  her  equals, — indeed,  if  their  own  account  of 
their  visions  was  to  be  believed,  her  superiors, — by  the  same 
methods  which  she  employed.  For  by  celibacy,  rigorous  fasts,  per¬ 
fect  bodily  quiescence,  and  intense  contemplation  of  one  thought, 
they,  too,  pretended  to  be  able  to  rise  above  the  body  into  the  heav¬ 
enly  regions,  and  to  behold  things  unspeakable,  which,  nevertheless, 
like  most  other  unspeakable  things,  contrived  to  be  most  carefully 

detailed  and  noised  abroad . And  it  was  with  a  half  feeling  of 

shame  that  she  prepared  herself  that  afternoon  for  one  more,  perhaps 
one  last  attempt,  to  scale  the  heavens,  as  she  recollected  how  many 
an  illiterate  monk  and  nun,  from  Constantinople  to  the  Thebaid,  was 
probably  employed  at  that  moment  exactly  as  she  was.  Still,  the  at¬ 
tempt  must  be  made.  In  that  terrible  abyss  of  doubt,  she  must  have 
something  palpable,  real  ;  something  beyond  her  own  thoughts,  and 
hopes,  and  speculations,  whereon  to  rest  her  weary  faith,  her  weary 

heart . Perhaps  this  time,  at  least,  in  her  extremest  need,  a  god 

might  vouchsafe  some  glimpse  of  his  own  beauty . Athene 

might  pity  at  last . Or,  if  not  Athene,  some  archetype,  angel, 

demon . And  then  she  shuddered  at  the  thought  of  those  evil 

and  deceiving  spirits,  whose  delight  it  was  to  delude  and  tempt  the 
votaries  of  the  gods,  in  the  forms  of  angels  of  light.  But  even  in  the 
face  of  that  danger,  she  must  make  the  trial  once  again.  Was  she 
not  pure  and  spotless  as  Athene’s  self  ?  Would  not  her  innate  purity 
enable  her  to  discern,  by  an  instinctive  antipathy,  those  foul  beings 

beneath  the  fairest  mask  ?  At  least  she  must  make  the  trial . 

And  so,  with  a  look  of  intense  humility,  she  began  to  lay  aside  her 
jewels  and  her  upper  robes.  Then,  baring  her  bosom  and  her  feet, 
and  shaking  her  golden  tresses  loose,  she  laid  herself  down  upon  the 
couch,  crossed  her  hands  upon  her  breast,  and,  with  upturned, 
ecstatic  eyes,  waited  for  that  which  might  befall. 


294 


HYPATIA. 


There  she  lay,  hour  after  hour,  as  her  eye  gradually  kindled,  her 
bosom  heaved,  her  breath  came  fast :  but  there  was  no  more  sign  of 
life  in  those  straight,  still  limbs,  and  listless  feet  and  hands,  than  in 
Pygmalion’s  ivory  bride,  before  she  bloomed  into  human  flesh  and 
blood.  The  sun  sunk  toward  h’S  rest ;  the  roar  of  the  city  grew 
louder  and  louder  without ;  the  soMiers  reveled  and  laughed  below; 
but  every  sound  passed  through  unconscious  ears,  and  went  its  way 
unheeded.  Faitli,  hope,  reason  itself,  were  staked  upon  the  result 
of  that  daring  effort  to  scale  the  highest  Ixeaven.  And,  by  one  con¬ 
tinuous  effort  of  her  practiced  will,  which  reached  its  highest  virtue, 
as  mystics  hold,  in  its  own  suicide,  she  -jhaiued  down  her  senses 
from  every  sight  and  sound,  and  even  her  mind  from  every  thought, 
and  lay  utterly  self-resigned,  self-emptied  tid  consciousness  of  time 
and  place  had  vanished,  and  she  seemed  t(>  herself  alone  in  the 
abyss. 

She  dared  not  reflect,  she  dared  not  hope,  sh''  dared  not  rejoice, 

lest  she  should  break  the  spell . Again  and  again  had  she  broken 

it  at  this  very  point,  by  some  sudden  and  tumultuous  yielding  to  her 

own  joy  or  awe  ;  but  now  her  will  held  firm . She  did  not  feel  her 

own  limbs,  hear  her  own  breath . A  light  bright  mist,  an  endless 

network  of  glittering  films,  coming,  going,  uniting,  resolving  them¬ 
selves,  was  above  her  and  around  her . Was  she  in  the  bodj'  or 

out  of  the  body  ?.  . .  . 

*  *  *  -X-  *  * 

The  network  faded  into  an  abyss  of  still,  clear  light . A  still, 

warm  atmosphere  was  around  her,  thrilling  through  and  through 

her . She  breathed  the  light,  and  floated  in  it,  as  a  moat  in  the 

midday  beam . And  still  her  will  held  firm. 

Far  away,  miles,  and  seons,  and  abysses  away,  through  the  inter¬ 
minable  depths  of  glory,  a  dark  and  shadowy  spot.  It  neared  and 

grew . A  dark  globe,  ringed  with  rainbows . What  might  it 

be  ?  She  dared  not  hope . It  came  nearer,  nearer,  nearer,  touched 

her . The  center  quivered,  flickered,  took  form, — a  face . A 

god’s?  No, — Pelagia’s  ! 

Beautiful,  sad,  craving,  reproachful,  indignant,  awful . Hypatia 

could  bear  no  more  ;  and  sprung  to  her  feet  with  a  shriek,  to  ex¬ 
perience  in  its  full  bitterness  the  fearful  revulsion  of  the  mystic, 
when  the  human  reason  and  will  which  he  has  spurned  re-assert  their 
God-given  rights  ;  and  after  the  intoxication  of  the  imagination, 
comes  its  prostration  and  collapse. 

And  this,  then,  was  the  answer  of  the  gods  !  The  phantom  of  her 
whom  she  had  despised,  exposed,  spurned  from  her  !  “  No,  not  their 

answer, — the  answer  of  my  own  soul  !  Fool  that  I  have  been  !  1 

have  been  exerting  my  will  most  while  I  pretended  to  resign  it  most  1 
I  have  been  the  slave  of  every  mental  desire,  while  I  tried  to  trample 
on  them  !  What  if  that  network  of  light,  that  blaze,  that  globe  of 


BEEKim  AFTER  A  SIGN. 


20S 


darkness,  have  been,  like  the  face  of  Pelagia,  the  phantoms  of  my 
own  imagination, — ay,  even  of  ray  own  senses  ?  What  if  I  have  mis¬ 
taken  for  Deity  my  own  self  ?  What  if  I  have  been  my  own  light, 
my  own  abyss  ?. . .  .Am  I  not  my  own  abyss,  my  own  light, — my  own 
darkness?”  And  she  smiled  bitterly  as  she  said  it,  and,  throwing 
herself  again  upon  the  couch,  buried  her  head  in  her  hands,  exhaust¬ 
ed  equally  in  body  and  in  mind. 

At  last  she  rose,  and  sat,  careless  of  her  dishevelled  locks,  gazing 
out  into  vacancy.  “  O  for  a  sign,  for  a  token  !  O  for  the  golden 
days  of  which  the  poet  sung,  when  gods  walked  among  men,  fought 
by  their  side  as  friends  !  And  yet.  . .  .are  those  old  stories  credible, 
pious,  even  modest  ?  Does  not  my  heart  revolt  from  them  ?  Who 
has  shared  more  than  I  in  Plato’s  contempt  for  the  foul  deeds,  the 
degrading  transformations,  which  Homer  imputes  to  the  gods  of 
Greece  ?  Must  I  believe  them  now  ?  Must  I  stoop  to  think  that  gods, 
who  live  in  a  region  above  all  sense,  will  deign  to  make  themselves 
palpaple  to  those  senses  of  ours  which  are  whole  aeons  of  existence 
below  them? — degrade  themselves  to  the  base  accidents  of  matter? 
Yes  !  That,  rather  than  nothing  !. . .  .Be  it  even  so.  Better,  better, 
better,  to  believe  that  Ares  fled  shrieking  and  wounded  from  a  mortal 
man, — better  to  believe  in  Jove’s  adulteries  and  Hermes’s  thefts, — 
than  to  believe  that  gods  have  never  spoken  face  to  face  with  men  ! 
Let  me  think,  lest  I  go  mad,  that  beings  from  that  unseen  world  for 
which  I  hunger'  have  appeared,  and  held  communion  with  mankind, 
such  as  no  reason  or  sense  could  doubt, — even  though  those  beings 
were  more  capricious  and  baser  than  ourselves  !  Is  there,  after  all, 
an  unseen  world  ?  O  for  a  sign,  a  sign  !  ” 

Haggard  and  dizzy,  she  wandered  into  her  “chamber  of  the  gods  ;  ” 
a  collection  of  antiquities,  which  she  kept  there  rather  as  matters  of 
taste  than  of  worship..  All  around  her  they  looked  out  into  vacancy 
with  their  white,  soulless  eyeballs,  their  dead,  motionless  beauty, 
those  cold  dreams  of  the  buried  generations,  O  that  they  could 
speak,  and  set  her  heart  at  rest  !  At  the  lower  end  of  the  room  stood 
a  Minerva,  completely  armed  with  aegis,  spear,  and  helmet ;  a  gem  of 
Athenian  sculpture,  which  she  had  bought  from  some  merchants 
after  the  sack  of  Athens  by  the  Goths.  Tliere  it  stood,  severely  fair  ; 
but  the  right  hand,  alas  !  was  gone  ;  and  there  the  maimed  arm  re¬ 
mained  extended,  as  if  in  sad  mockery  of  the  faith  of  which  the  body 
remained,  while  the  power  was  dead  and  vanished. 

She  gazed  long  and  passionately  on  the  image  of  her  favorite  god¬ 
dess,  the  ideal  to  which  she  had  longed  for  years  to  assimilate  herself  ; 
till — was  it  a  dream  ?  was  it  a  frolic  of  the  dying  sunlight  ?  or  did 
those  lips  really  bend  themselves  into  a  smile  ? 

Impossible  !  No,  not  impossible.  Had  not,  only  a  few  years  before, 
the  image  of  Hecate  smiled  on  a  philosopher?  Were  there  not  stories 
of  moving  images,  and  winking  pictures,  and  all  the  material  miracles 
by  which  a  dying  faith  strives  desperately,  not  to  deceive  others,  but 


M  MTPATIA. 

to  persuade  itself  of  its  own  sanity  ?  It  had  been^ — it  might  be, — it 
was  ! - 

No  !  there  the  lips  were,  as  they  had  been  from  the  beginning, 
closed  upon  each  other  in  that  stony,  self-collected  calm,  which  was 
only  not  a  sneer.  The  wonder,  if  it  was  one,  had  passed,  and  now — 
did  her  eyes  play  her  false,  or  were  the  snakes  round  that  Medusa’s 
head  upon  the  shield  all  writhing,  grinning,  glaring  at  her  with  stony 
eyes,  longing  to  stifEen  her  with  terror  into  their  own  likeness? 

No  !  that,  too,  passed.  Would  that  even  it  had  stayed,  for  it 
would  have  been  a  sign  of  life  !  She  looked  up  at  the  face  once 
more  :  but  in  vain, — the  stone  was  stone  ;  and  ere  she  was  aware, 
she  found  herself  clasping  passionately  the  knees  of  the  marble. 

“  Athene  !  Pallas  !  Adored  !  Ever  Virgin  !  Absolute  Reason,  spring¬ 
ing  unbegotten  from  the  nameless  One  !  Hear  me  !  Athene  !  Have 
mercy  on  me  !  Speak,  if  it  be  to  curse  me  !  Thou  who  alone  wield- 
est  the  lightnings  of  thy  father,  wield  them  to  strike  me  dead,  if  thou 
wilt  ;  only  do  something  ! — something  to  prove  thine  own  existence, — 
something  to  make  me  sure  that  anything  exists  besides  this  gross 
miserable  matter,  and  my  miserable  soul.  I  stand  alone  in  the  cen¬ 
ter  of  the  universe  !  I  fall  and  sicken  down  the  abyss  of  ignorance, 
and  doubt,  and  boundless  blank  and  darkness  !  O.  have  mercy  !  I 
know  that  thou  art  not  this  !  Thou  art  everywhere  and  in  all  things  ! 
But  I  know  that  this  is  a  form  which  pleases  thee,  which  symbolizes 
thy  nobleness  !  I  now  that  thou  hast  deigned  to  speak  to  those  who 
— 0,  what  do  I  know?  Nothing  !  nothing  !  nothing  !  ” 

And  she  clung  there,  bedewing  with  scalding  tears  the  cold  feet  of 
the  image,  while  there  was  neither  sign,  nor  voice,  nor  any  that 
answered. 

On  a  sudden  she  was  startled  by  a  rustling  near ;  and.  looking 
round,  saw  close  behind  her  the  old  Jewess. 

“  Cry  aloud  !  ”  hissed  the  hag,  in  a  tone  of  bitter  scorn  :  “  cry  aloud, 
for  she  is  a  goddess.  Either  she  is  talking,  or  pursuing,  or  she  is  on 
a  journey  :  or  perhaps  she  has  grown  old,  as  we  all  shall  do  some 
day,  my  pretty  lady,  and  is  too  cross  and  lazy  to  stir.  What  !  her 
naughty  doll  will  not  speak  to  her,  will  it  not  ?  or  even  open  its  eyes, 
because  the  wires  are  grown  rusty?  Well,  we  will  find  a  new  doll 
for  her,  if  she  chooses.” 

“  Begone  hag  !  What  do  you  mean  by  intruding  here?”  said  Hy¬ 
patia,  springing  up.  But  the  old  woman  went  on  coolly, — 

“  Why  not  try  the  fair  young  gentleman  over  there  ?  ”  pointing  to 
a  copy  of  the  Apollo  which  we  call  Belvedere, — What’s  his  name? 
Old  maids  are  always  cross  and  jealous,  you  know.  But  he — he 
could  not  be  cruel  to  such  a  sweet  face  as  that.  Try  the  young 
gentleman  !  Or  perhaps,  if  you  are  bashful,  the  old  Jewess  might 
try  him  for  you  ?” 

These  last  words  were  spoken  with  so  marked  a  significance,  that 
Hypatia,  in  spite  of  her  disgust  fniiiid  herseff  asking  the  hag  what 


SEEKING  AFTER  A  SIGN 


S97 


(ghe  meant.  Slie  made  no  answer  for  a  few  seconds,  but  remained 
looking  steadily  into  lier  eyes  with  a  glance  of  fire,  before  which  even 
the  proud  Hypatia,  as  she  had  done  once  before,  quailed  utterly,  so 
deep  was  the  understanding,  so  dogged  the  purpose,  so  fearless  the 
power,  which  burned  within  those  withered  and  sunken  sockets. 

“  Shall  the  old  witch  call  him  up,  the  fair  young  Apollo,  vutli  the 
beauty-bloom  upon  his  chin  ?  He  shall  come  !  He  shall  come  !  I 
warrant  him  he  must  come,  civilly  enough,  when  old  Miriam’s  finger 
is  once  held  up.” 

To  you  ?  Apollo,  the  god  of  light,  obey  a  Jewess  ?” 

'‘A  Jewess?  And  you  a  Greek ?”  almost  yelled  the  old  woman. 
“And  who  are  you  who  ask?  And  who  are  your  gods,  your  hero(\s. 
your  devils,  you  children  of  yesterday,  compared  with  us?  You,  who 
were  a  set  of  half-naked  savages  squabbling  about  the  siege  of  Troy, 
when  our  Solomon,  amid  splendors  such  as  Rome  and  Constantinople 
never  saw,  was  controlling  demons  and  ghosts,  angels  and  archangels, 
principalities  and  powers,  by  the  ineffable  name  ?  What  science  have 
you  that  you  have  not  stolen  from  the  Egyptians  and  Chaldees?  And 
what  had  the  Egyptians  which  Moses  did  not  teach  them  ?  And 
what  have  the  Chaldees  which  Daniel  did  not  teach  them  ?  What 
does  the  world  know  but  from  us,  the  fathers,  and  the  masters  of  magic, 
— us,  the  lords  of  the  inner  secrets  of  the  universe  ?  Come,  you  Greek 
baby, — as  the  priests  in  Egypt  said  of  your  forefathers,  always  chil¬ 
dren,  craving  for  a  new  toy,  and  throwing  it  away  next  day, — come 
to  the  fountain-head  of  all  your  paltry  wisdom  !  Name  what  you  will 
see,  and  you  shall  see  it  !  ” 

Hypatia  was  cowed  ;  for  of  one  thing  there  was  no  doubt, — that 
the  woman  utterly  believed  her  own  words  ;  and  that  was  a  state  of 
mind  of  which  she  had  seen  so  little,  that  it  was  no  wonder  if  it 
acted  on  her  with  that  overpowering  sympathetic  force  with  which  it 
generally  does,  and  perhaps  ought,  to  act  on  the  human  heart.  Be¬ 
sides,  her  school  had  always  looked  to  the  ancient  nations  of  the 
East  for  the  primeval  founts  of  inspiration,  the  mysterious  lore  of 
mightier  races  long  gone  by.  Might  she  not  have  found  it  now  ? 

The  Jewess  saw  her  advantage  in  a  moment,  and  ran  on,  without 
giving  her  time  to  answer,- — 

“  What  sort  shall  it  be,  then  ?  By  glass  and  water,  or  by  the  moon¬ 
light  on  the  wall,  or  by  the  sieve,  or  by  the  meal  ?  By  the  cymbals, 
or  by  the  stars  ?  By  the  table  of  the  twenty-four  elements,  by  which 
the  empire  was  promised  to  Theodosius  the  Great,  or  by  the  sacred 
counters  of  the  Assyrians,  or  by  the  sapphire  of  the  Hecatic  sphere? 
Shall  I  threaten,  as  the  Egyptian  priest  used  to  do,  to  tear  Osiris 
again  in  pieces,  or  to  divulge  the  mysteries  of  Isis  ?  I  could  do  it,  if 
I  chose  ;  for  I  know  them  all,  and  more.  Or  shall  I  use  the  ineffable 
name  on  Solomon’s  seal,  which  we  alone,  of  all  the  nations  of  the 
earth,  know?  No  ;  it  would  be  a  pity  to  waste  that  upon  a  heathen. 
It  shall  be  by  the  sacred  wafer.  Look  here  ! — here  they  are,  the 


298 


HYPATIA. 


wonder-working  atomies  !  Eat  no  food  this  day,  except  one  of  tliest, 
every  three  hours,  and  come  to  me  to-night  at  the  house  of  youi 
porter,  Eudaemon,  bringing  with  you  the  black  agate  ;  and  then,— 
why,  then,  wdiat  you  have  the  heart  to  see,  you  shall  see  !  ” 

Hypatia  took  the  wafers,  hesitating, — 

“  But  what  are  they  ?  ” 

“  And  you  profess  to  explain  Homer  ?  Whom  did  I  hear  the  other 
morning  lecturing  away  so  glibly  on  the  nepenthe  which  Helen  gave 
the  heroes,  to  fill  them  wuth  the  spirit  of  joy  and  love  ;  how  it  was 
an  allegory  of  the  inward  inspiration  which  flow's  from  spiritual 
beauty,  and  all  that? — Pretty  enough,  fair  lady;  but  the  question 
still  remains,  what  was  it?  and  I  say  it  was  this.  Take  it  and  try  ; 
and  then  confess  that,  wdiile  you  can  talk  about  Helen,  I  can  act  her, 
and  know  a  little  more  about  Homer  than  you  do,  after  all,” 

“  1  cannot  believe  you  !  Give  me  some  sign  of  your  power,  or  how 
can  I  trust  you  ?  ” 

“  A  sign? — a  sign  ?  Kneel  down  then  there,  with  your  face  toward 
the  north  ;  you  are  over  tall  for  the  poor  old  crijrple  !  ” 

“I?  I  never  knelt  to  a  human  being,” 

“  Then  consider  that  you  kneel  to  the  handsome  idol  there,  if  you 
will — but  kneel  !  ” 

And,  constrained  by  that  glittering  eye,  Hypatia  knelt  before  her. 
“Have  you  faith?  Have  you  desire?  Will  you  submit  ?  Will 
you  obey  ?  Self-will  and  pride  see  nothing,  know  nothing.  If  you 
do  not  give  up  yourself,  neither  god  nor  devil  will  care  to  approach. 
Do  you  submit  ?  ” 

“  I  do  !  I  do  !”  cried  poor  Hypatia  in  an  agony  of  curiosity  and 
self-distrust,  while  she  felt  her  eye  quailing  and  her  limbs  loosening 
more  and  more  every  moment  under  that  intolerable  fascination. 

The  old  woman  drew  from  her  bosom  a  crystal,  and  placed  the 

point  against  Hypatia’s  breast.  A  cold  shiver  ran  through  her . 

The  witch  w'aved  her  hand  mysteriously  round  her  head,  muttering 
from  time  to  time,  “  Down  !  down,  proud  spirit  !  ”  and  then  placed 
the  tips  of  her  skinny  fingers  on  the  victim’s  forehead.  Gradually 
her  eyelids  became  heavy  ;  again  and  again  she  tried  to  raise  them, 
and  dropped  them  again  before  those  fixed,  glaring  eyes.  . .  .and  in 

another  moment  she  lost  consciousness . 

Wheji  she  awoke,  she  was  kneeling  in  a  distant  part  of  the  room, 
with  dishevelled  hair  and  garments.  What  was  it  so  cold  that  she 
was  clasping  in  her  arms  ?  The  feet  of  the  Apollo.  The  hag  stood 
by  her,  chuckling  to  herself  and  clapping  her  hands. 

“  How  came  I  here  ?  What  have  I  been  doing  ?  ” 

“  Saying  such  pretty  things  ! — paying  the  fair  youth  there  such 
compliments,  as  he  will  not  be  rude  enough  to  forget  in  his  visit  to¬ 
night.  A  charming  prophetic  trance  you  have  had  !  Ah,  ha  !  you 
are  not  the  only  woman  who  is  wiser  asleep  than  awake  !  Wtdl,  you 
will  make  a  very  pretty  Cassandra, — or  a  Clytia,  if  you  have  the 


SEEKING  AFTER  A  SIGN. 


299 


sense . It  lies  with  you,  my  fair  lady.  Are  you  satisfied  now? 

Will  you  have  any  more  signs?  Shall  the  old  Jewess  blast  those 
blue  eyes  blind  to  show  that  she  knows  more  than  the  heathen  ?  ” 

“  O,  I  believe  you, — I  believe/’  cried  the  poor,  exhausted  maiden. 

I  will  come  ;  and  yet - ” 

“  Ah  !  yes  !  You  had  better  settle  first  how  he  shall  appear.” 

‘  ‘  As  he  wills  ! — let  him  only  come  !  Only  let  me  know  that  he  is 
a  god.  Abamnon  said  that  gods  appeared  in  a  clear,  steady,  unbear¬ 
able  light,  amid  a  choir  of  all  the  lesser  deities,  archangels,  princi¬ 
palities,  and  heroes,  who  derive  their  life  from  them.” 

“Abamnon  was  an  old  fool,  then.  Do  you  think  young  Phoebus 
ran  after  Daphne  with  such  a  mob  at  his  heels  ?  or  that  Jove,  when 
he  swam  up  to  Leda,  headed  a  whole  Nile-fiock  of  ducks,  and  plover, 
and  curlews?  No,  he  shall  come  alone, — to  you  alone  ;  and  then  you 

may  choose  for  yourself  between  Cassandra  and  Clytia . Farewell. 

Do  not  forget  your  wafers,  or  the  agate  either,  and  talk  with  no  one 
between  now  and  sunset.  And  then — my  pretty  lady  !  ” 

And  laughing  to  herself,  the  old  hag  glided  from  the  room. 

Hypatia  sat  trembling  with  shame  and  dread.  She,  as  a  disciple 
of  the  more  purely  spiritualistic  school  of  Porphyry,  had  always 
looked  with  aversion,  with  all  but  contempt,  on  those  theurgic  arts 
which  were  so  much  lauded  and  employed  by  lamblicus,  Abamnon, 
and  those  who  clung  lovingly  to  the  old  priestly  rites  of  Egypt  and 
Chaldsea.  They  had  seemed  to  her  vulgar  toys,  tricks  of  legerde¬ 
main,  suited  only  for  the  wonder  of  the  mob . She  began  to  think 

of  them  with  more  favor  now.  How  did  she  know  that  the  vulgar 
did  not  require  signs  and  wonders  to  make  them  believe  ?.  . .  .How, 
indeed  ?  for  did  she,  not  want  such  herself  ?  And  she  opened  Abam- 
non’s  famous  letter  to  Porphyry,  and  read  earnestly  over,  for  the 
twentieth  time,  his  subtle  justification  of  magic,  and  felt  it  to  be  un¬ 
answerable.  Magic  ?  What  was  not  magical  ?  The  whole  universe, 
from  the  planets  over  her  head  to  the  meanest  pebble  at  her  feet, 
was  utterly  mysterious,  ineffable,  miraculous,  influencing  and  in¬ 
fluenced  by  affinities  and  repulsions  as  unexpected,  as  unfathoma¬ 
ble,  as  those  which,  as  Abamnon  said,  drew  the  gods  toward  those 
sounds,  those  objects,  which,  either  in  form,  or  color,  or  chemical 
properties,  were  symbolic  of  or  akin  to  themselves.  What  wonder  in 
it,  after  all  ?  Was  not  love  and  hatred,  sympathy  and  antipathy,  the 
law  of  the  universe  ?  Philosophers,  when  they  gave  mechanical  ex¬ 
planations  of  natural  phenomena,  came  no  nearer  to  the  real  solution 

of  them.  The  mysterious  “Why?”  remained  untouched . All 

their  analyses  could  only  darken  with  big  words  the  plain  fact  that 
the  water  hated  the  oil  with  which  it  refused  to  mix,  the  lime  loved 
the  acid  which  it  eagerly  received  into  itself,  and,  like  a  lover,  grew 
warm  with  the  rapture  of  affection.  Why  not  ?  What  right  had  we 
to  deny  sensation,  emotion,  to  them,  any  more  than  to  ourselves? 
Was  not  the  same  universal  spirit  stirring  in  them  as  in  us?  And 


soo 


HYPATIA, 


was  it  not  by  virtue  of  that  spirit  tliat  we  tbouglit,  and  felt,  and 
loved  ? — Then  wby  not  tliey,  as  well  as  we  ?  If  tlie  one  spirit  per¬ 
meated  all  things,  if  its  all-energizing  presence  linked  the  flower  with 
the  crystal  as  well  as  with  the  demon  and  the  god,  must  it  not  link 
together  also  the  two  extremes  of  the  great  chain  of  being?  bind 
even  the  nameless  One  itself  to  the  smallest  creature  which  bore  its 
creative  impress  ?  What  greater  miracle  in  the  attraction  of  a  god  or 
an  angel,  by  material  incense,  symbols,  and  spells,  than  in  the  attrac¬ 
tion  of  one  soul  to  another  by  the  material  sounds  of  the  human 
voice?  Was  the  affinity  between  spirit  and  matter  implied  in  that, 
more  miraculous  than  the  affinity  between  the  soul  and  the  body  ? — 
than  the  retention  of  that  soul  within  that  body  by  the  breathing  of 
material  air,  the  eating  of  material  food  ?  Or  even,  if  the  physicists 
were  right,  and  the  soul  were  but  a  material  product  or  energy  of  the 
nerves,  and  the  sole  law  of  the  universe  the  laws  of  matter,  then  was 
not  magic  even  more  probable,  more  rational?  Was  it  not  fair  by  every 
analogy  to  suppose  that  there  might  be  other,  higher  beings  than 
ourselves,  obedient  to  those  laws,  and  therefore  x3ossible  to  be  attract¬ 
ed,  even  as  human  beings  were,  by  the  baits  of  material  sights  and 
sounds?.  .  .  .If  spirit  pervaded  all  things  then  was  magic  probable  ; 
if  nothing  but  matter  had  existence,  magic  was  morally  certain..  All 

that  remained  in  either  case  was  the  test  of  experience . And  had 

not  that  test  been  applied  in  every  age,  and  asserted  to  succeed? 
What  more  rational,  more  philosophic  action,  than  to  try  herself  those 
methods  and  ceremonies  which  she  was  assured  on  every  hand  had 
never  failed  but  through  the  ignorance  or  unfitness  of  the  neophyte  ? 

....  Abamnon  must  be  right . She  dared  not  think  him  wrong  :  for 

if  this  last  hope  failed,  what  was  there  left  but  to  eat  and  drink-  " 
to-morrow  we  die  ? 


CHAPTER  XXVI. 

MIRIAM’S  PLOT. 

He  wlio  lias  worshiped  a  woman,  even  against  liis  will  and  con¬ 
science,  knows  well  liow  storm  may  follow  storm,  and  earthquake 
earthquake,  before  his  idol  be  utterly  overthrown.  And  so  Philam- 
mon  found  that  evening,  as  he  sat  pondering  over  the  strange 
chances  of  the  day  ;  for  as  he  pondered,  his  old  feelings  toward  Hy¬ 
patia  began,  in  spite  of  the  struggles  of  his  conscience  and  reason, 
to  revive  within  him.  Not  only  pure  love  of  her  great  loveliness, 
the  righteous  instinct  which  bids  us  welcome  and  honor  beauty, 
whether  in  man  or  woman,  as  something  of  real  worth, — divine, 
heavenly,  ay,  though  we  know  not  how,  in  a  most  deep  sense  eter¬ 
nal  ;  which  makes  our  reason  give  the  lie  to  all  merely  logical  and 
sentimental  maunderings  of  moralists  about  ‘  ‘  the  fleeting  hues  of 
this  our  painted  clay  ;  ”  telling  men,  as  the  old  Hebrew  Scriptures 
tell  them,  that  physical  beauty  is  the  deepest  of  all  spiritual  sym¬ 
bols  ;  and  that,  though  beauty  without  discretion  be  the  jewel  of 
gold  in  the  swine’s  snout,  yet  the  jewel  of  gold  it  is  still,  the  sacra¬ 
ment  of  an  inward  beauty  which  ought  to  be,  perhaps  hereafter  may 
be,  fulfllled  in  spirit  and  in  truth.  Not  only  this,  which  whispered 
to  him, — and  who  shall  say  that  the  whisper  was  of  the  earth  or  of 
the  lower  world ? — “She  is  too  beautiful  to  be  utterly  evil;”  but 
the  very  defect  in  her  creed  which  he  had  just  discovered,  drew  him 
toward  her  again.  She  had  no  gospel  for  the  Magdalene,  because 

she  was  a  Pagan . That,  then,  was  the  fault  of  her  Paganism, 

not  of  herself.  She  had  felt  for  Pelagia  :  but  even  if  she  had  not, 
was  not  that,  too,  the  fault  of  her  Paganism  ?  And  for  that  Pagan¬ 
ism  who  was  to  be  blamed?  She?.... Was  he  the  man  to  affirm 
that  ?  Had  he  not  seen  scandals,  stupidities,  brutalities,  enough  to 
shake  even  his  faith,  educated  a  Christian  ?  How  much  more  excuse 
for  her,  more  delicate,  more  acute,  more  lofty  than  he  ;  the  child,  too, 
of  a  heathen  father  !  Her  perfections,  were  they  not  her  own  ? — her 
defects,  those  of  her  circumstances  ?...  .And  had  she  not  welcomed 
him,  guarded  him,  taught  him,  honored  him  ?...  .Could  he  turn 
against  her  ? — above  all  now  in  her  distress, — perhaps  her  danger  ? 
Was  he  not  bound  to  her,  if  by  nothing  else,  by  gratitude  !  Was 
not  he,  of  all  men,  bound  to  believe  that  all  she  required  to  make 
her  perfect  was  conversion  to  the  true  faith  ?. . .  .And  then  that  first 
dream  of  converting  her  arose  almost  as  bright  as  ever. . . .  .And  then 

(301) 


302 


HYPATIA. 


lie  was  checked  by  the  tliouglit  of  liis  first  utter  failure . At  least, 

if  lie  could  not  convert  her,  he  could  love  her,  pray  for  her . No, 

he  could  not  even  do  that  ;  for  to  whom  could  he  pray  ?  He  had  to 
repent,  to  be  forgiven,  to  humble  himself  by  penitence,  perhaps  for 
years,  ere  he  could  hope  to  be  heard  even  for  himself,  much  less  for 

another . And  so  backward  and  forward  swayed  his  hope  and 

purpose,  till  he  was  roused  from  his  meditation  by  the  voice  of  the 
little  porter,  summoning  him  to  his  evening  meal  ;  and  recollecting, 
for  the  first  time,  that  he  had  tasted  no  food  that  day,  he  went  down, 
half  unwillingly,  and  ate. 

But  as  he,  the  porter,  and  his  negro  wife  were  sitting  silently  and 
sadly  enough  together,  Miriam  came  in,  apparently  in  high  good- 
humor,  and  lingered  a  moment  on  her  way  to  her  own  apartments  up¬ 
stairs. 

“Eh?  At  supper?  And  nothing  but  lentils  and  water-melons, 
when  the  flesh-pots  of  Egypt  have  been  famous  any  time  these  two 
thousand  years.  Ah  !  but  times  are  changed  since  then  !....You 
have  worn  out  the  old  Hebrew  hints,  you  miserable  Gentiles  you,  and 
got  a  Csesar  instead  of  a  Joseph  !  Hist,  you  hussies  !  "  cried  she  to 
the  girls  up-stairs,  clapping  her  hands  loudly.  “Here  !  bring  us 
down  one  of  those  roast  chickens,  and  a  bottle  of  the  wine  of  wines, 
— the  wine  with  the  green  seal,  you  careless  daughters  of  Midian, 
you,  with  your  wits  running  on  the  men.  I’ll  warrant,  every  minute 
Eve  been  out  of  the  house  !  Ah,  you’ll  smart  for  it  some  day, — you’ll 
smart  for  it  some  day,  you  daughters  of  Adam’s  first  wife  !  ” 

Down  came,  by  the  hands  of  one  of  the  Syrian  slave-girls,  the  fowl 
and  the  wine. 

“  There,  now  ;  we’ll  all  sup  together.  Wine,  that  maketh  glad 
the  heart  of  man, — youth,  you  v^ere  a  monk  once,  so  you  have  read 
all  about  that,  eh  ?  and  about  the  best  wine  which  goes  down  sweetly, 
causing  the  lips  of  them  that  are  asleep  to  speak.  And  rare  wine  it 
was,  I  warrant,  which  the  blessed  Solomon  had  in  his  little  country 
cellar  up  there* in  Lebanon.  We’ll  fry  if  this  is  not  a  very  fair 
substitute  for  it,  though.  Come,  my  little  man-monkey,  drink,  and 
forget  your  sorrow.  You  shall  be  temple-sweeper  to  Beelzebub  yet, 
I  promise  you.  Look  at  it  there,  creaming  and  curdling,  the  darling  ! 
purring  like  a  cat  at  the  very  thought  of  touching  human  lips  !  As 
sweet  as  honey,  as  strong  as  fire,  as  clear  as  amber  !  Drink,  ye 
children  of  Gehenna  ;  and  make  good  use  of  the  little  time  that  is 
left  you  between  this  and  the  unquenchable  fire.” 

And  tossing  a  cup  of  it  down  her  own  throat,  as  if  it  had  been 
water,  she  watched  her  companions  with  a  meaning  look,  as  they 
drank. 

The  little  porter  followed  her  example  gallantly.  Philammon 
looked,  and  longed,  and  sipped  blushingly  and  bashfully,  and  tried 
to  fancy  that  he  did  not  care  for  it  ;  and  sipped  again,  being  willing 
enough  to  forget  his  sorrow  also  for  a  moment  ;  the  negress  refused 
with  fear  and  trembling, — “  She  had  a  vow  on  her,” 


MIRIAM '8  PLOT. 


303 


‘‘  Satun  possess  you  and  your  vow  !  Drink,  you  coal  out  of  Topliet  ! 
Do  you  tliink  it  is  poisoned?  You,  tlie  only  creature  in  the  world 
that  I  should  not  enjoy  ill-using,  because  every  one  else  ill-uses  you 
already  without  my  help  !  Drink,  I  say,  or  I’ll  turn  you  pea-green 
from  head  to  foot  !  ” 

The  negress  put  the  cup  to  her  lips,  and  contrived,  for  her  own 
reasons,  to  spill  the  contents  unobserved. 

“  A  very  fine  lecture  that  of  the  Lady  Hypatia’s  the  other  morning, 
on  Helen’s  nepenthe,”  quoth  the  little  porter,  growing  philosophic 
as  the  wine-fumes  rose.  “  Such  a  power  of  extracting  the  cold  water 
of  philosophy  out  of  ihe  bottomless  pit  of  Mythus,  I  never  did  hear. 
Did  you  ever,  my  Philammonidion  ?” 

“  Aha  ?  she  and  I  were  talking  about  that  half  an  hour  ago,”  said 
Miriam. 

‘  ‘  What  !  have  you  seen  her  ?  ”  asked  Philammon,  with  a  flutter  of 
the  heart. 

“  If  you  mean,  did  she  mention  you, — why,  then,  yes  !  ” 

“  How  ? — how  ?  ” 

“  Talked  of  a  young  Phoebus  Apollo, — without  mentioning  names, 
certainly,  but  in  the  most  sensible,  and  practical,  and  hopeful  way, 
— the  wisest  speech  that  I  have  heard  from  her  this  twelvemonth.” 

Philammon  blushed  scarlet. 

“  And  that,”  thought  he,  “  in  spite  of  what  passed  this  morning  ! — 
Why,  what  is  the  matter  with  our  host  ?  ” 

“  He  has  taken  Solomon’s  advice,  and  forgotten  his  sorrow.” 

And  so,  indeed,  he  had  ;  for  he  was  sleeping  sweetly,  with  open, 
lack-luster  eyes,  and  a  maudlin  smile  at  the  ceiling  ;  while  the  ne¬ 
gress,  with  her  head  fallen  on  her  chest,  seemed  equally  unconscious 
of  their  presence. 

‘‘We’ll  see,”  quoth  Miriam  ;  and  taking  up  the  lamp,  she  held  the 
flame  unceremoniously  to  the  arm  of  each  of  them  ;  but  neither 
winced  or  stirred. 

‘  ‘  Surely,  your  wine  is  not  drugged  ?  ”  said  Philammon,  in  trepida¬ 
tion. 

“  Why  not  !  What  has  made  them  beasts  may  make  us  angels. 
You  seem  none  the  less  lively  for  it  !  Do  I  ?  ” 

‘  ‘  But  drugged  wine  ?  ” 

“  Why  not  ?  The  same  who  made  wine  made  poppy-juice.  Both 
will  make  man  happy.  Why  not  use  both  ?” 

“  It  is  poison  !  ” 

“  It  is  the  nepenthe,  as  I  told  Hypatia,  whereof  she  was  twaddling 
mysticism  this  morning.  Drink,  child,  drink  !  I  have  no  mind  to 
put  you  to  sleep  to-night  !  I  want  to  make  a  man  of  you,  or  rather, 
to  see  whether  you  are  one  !  ” 

And  she  drained  another  cup,  and  then  went  on,  half  talking  to 
herself, — 

“  Ay,  it  is  poison  ;  and  music  is  poison  ;  and  woman  is  poison,  a^ 


/ 


304  HYPATIA. 

cording  to  the  new  creed,  Pagan  and  Christian ;  and  wine  will  he 
poison,  and  meat  will  be  poison,  some  day  ;  and  we  shall  have  a  world 
full  of  mad  Nebuchadnezzars  eating  grass  like  oxen.  It  is  poison¬ 
ous,  and  brutal,  and  devilish,  to  be  a  man,  and  not  a  monk,  and  a 
eunuch,  and  a  dry  branch.  You  are  all  in  the  same  lie,  Christians 
and  philosophers,  Cyril  and  Hypatia  !  Don’t  interrupt  me,  but  drink, 

young  fool  ! - Ay,  and  the  only  man  who  keeps  his  manhood,  the 

only  man  who  is  not  ashamed  to  be  what  God  has  made  him,  is  your 
Jew.  You  will  find  yourselves  in  want  of  him  after  all,  some  day, 
you  besotted  Gentiles,  to  bring  you  back  to  common  sense  and  com¬ 
mon  manhood. — In  want  of  him  and  his  grand  old  books,  which  you 
despise  while  you  make  idols  of  them,  about  Abraham,  and  Jacob, 
and  Moses,  and  David,  and  Solomon,  whom  you  call  saints,  you  mis¬ 
erable  hypocrites,  though  they  did  what  you  are  too  dainty  to  do  and 
had  their  wives  and  their  children,  and  thanked  God  for  a  beautiful 
woman,  as  Adam  did  before  them,  and  their  sons  do  after  them, — 
drink,  I  say  ! — and  believed  that  God  had  really  made  the  world,  and 
not  the  Devil,  and  had  given  them  the  lordship  over  it,  as  you  will 
find  out  to  your  cost  some  day  !  ” 

Philammon  heard,  and  could  not  answer  ;  and  on  she  rambled. 

“And  music,  too?  Our  priests  were  not  afraid  of  sackbut  and 
psaltery,  dulcimer,  and  trumpet,  in  the  house  of  the  Lord  ;  for  they 
knew  who  had  given  them  the  cunning  to  make  them.  Our  prophets 
were  not  afraid  of  calling  for  music,  when  they  wished  to  prophesy, 
and  letting  it  soften  and  raise  their  souls,  and  open  and  quicken  them 
till  they  saw  into  the  inner  harmony  of  things,  and  beheld  the  future 
in  the  present ;  for  they  knew  who  made  the  melody  and  harmony, 
and  made  them  the  outward  symbols  of  the  inward  song  which  runs 
through  sun  and  stars,  storm  and  tempest,  fulfilling  His  word, — in 
that  these  sham  philosophers  the  heathen  are  wiser  than  those  Chris¬ 
tian  monks.  Try  it  ! — try  it  !  Come  with  me  ?  Leave  these  sleep¬ 
ers  here,  and  come  to  my  rooms.  You  long  to  be  as  wise  as  Solo¬ 
mon.  Then  get  at  wisdom  as  Solomon  did,  and  give  your  heart  first 

to  know  folly  and  madness . You  have  read  the  Book  of  the 

Preacher  ?  ” 

Poor  Philammon  !  He  was  no  longer  master  of  himself.  The  ar¬ 
guments,  the  wine,  the  terrible  spell  of  the  old  woman’s  voice  and 
eye,  and  the  strong,  overpowering  will  which  showed  out  through 
them,  dragged  him  along  in  spite  of  himself.  As  if  in  a  dream,  he 
followed  her  up  the  stairs. 

“  1  here,  throw  away  that  stupid,  ugly,  shapeless,  philosopher’s 
cloak.  So  !  You  have  on  the  white  tunic  I  gave  you  ?  And  now 
you  look  as  a  human  being  should.  And  you  have  been  to  the  baths 
to-day?  Well, — you  have  the  comfort  of  feeling  now  like  other  peo¬ 
ple,  and  having  that  alabaster  skin  as  white  as  it  was  created,  instead 
of  being  tanned  like  a  brute’s  hide.  Drink,  I  say  !  Ay,  what  was 
ths^t  face,  that  figure,  made  for  ?  Bring  a  mirror  here,  hussy  I  There, 


MIRIAM’S  PLOT. 


805 


look  in  that,  and  judge  for  yourself  !  Were  those  ripe  lips  rounded 
for  nothing  ?  Why  were  those  eyes  set  in  your  hr3ad,  and  made  to 
sparkle  bright  as  jewels,  sweet  as  mountain  honey?  Why  were  those 
curls  laid  ready  for  soft  fingers  to  twine  themselves  among  them,  and 
look  all  the  whiter  among  the  glossy  black  knots?  Judge  for  your¬ 
self  !  ” 

Alas  !  Poor  Philammon  ! 

“And  after  all,”  thought  he,  “is  it  not  true,  as  well  as  pleas¬ 
ant?” 

“  Sing  to  the  poor  boy,  girls  ! — sing  to  him  !  and  teach  him, 
Lor  the  first  time  in  his  little  ignorant  life,  the  old  road  to  inspi- 
lation  !  ” 

One  of  the  slave-girls  sat  down  on  the  divan,  and  took  up  a  double 
flute  ;  while  the  other  rose,  and  accompanying  the  plaintive,  dreamy 
air  with  a  slow  dance,  and  delicate  tinklings  of  her  silver  armlets  and 
anklets,  and  the  sistrum  which  she  held  aloft,  she  floated  gracefully 
round  and  round  the  floor,  and  sung, — 

“  Why  were  we  bom,  but  for  bliss  ? 

Why  are  we  ripe,  but  to  fall  ? 

Dream  not  tint  duty  can  bar  thee  from  beauty, 

Like  water  and  sunshine,  the  heirloom  of  all. 

“  Lips  were  made  only  to  kiss ; 

Hands  were  made  only  to  toy  : 

Eyes  were  paade  only  to  lure  on  the  lonely, 

The  longing,  the  loving,  and  drown  them  in  joy  1  ” 

Alas  for  poor  Philammon  !  And  yet  no  !  The  very  poison 
brought  with  it  its  own  antidote  ;  and,  shaking  off  by  one  strong 
effort  of  will  the  spell  of  the  music  and  the  wine,  he  sprung  to  his 
feet . 

“  Never  !  If  love  means  no  more  than  that, — if  it  is  to  be  a  mere 
delicate  self-indulgence,  worse  than  the  brute’s,  because  it  requires 
the  prostration  of  nobler  faculties,  and  a  selfishness  the  more  huge  in 
proportion  to  the  greatness  of  the  soul  which  is  crushed  inward  by 
it, — then  I  will  have  none  of  it  !  I  have  had  my  dream, — yes  !  but  it 
was  of  one  who  should  be  at  once  my  teacher  and  my  pupil,  my 
debtor  and  my  queen, — who  should  lean  on  me,  and  yet  support  me, 
— supply  my  defects,  although  with  lesser  light,  as  the  old  moon  fills 
up  the  circle  of  the  new, — labor  with  me  side  by  side  in  some  great 
work, — rising  with  me  forever  as  I  rose  : — and  this  is  the  base  sub¬ 
stitute  !  Never  !  ” 

Wiiether  or  not  this  was  unconsciously  forced  into  words  by  the 
vehemence  of  his  passion,  or  whether  the  old  Jewess  heard,  or  pre¬ 
tended  to  hear,  a  footstep  coming  up  the  stair,  she  at  all  events  sprung 
instantly  to  her  feet. 

‘  ‘  Hist !  Silence,  girls  !  I  hear  a  visitor.  What  mad  maiden  has 
come  to  beg  a  love-charm  of  the  poor  old  witch  at  this  time  of  night  ? 


80^ 


HYPATIA. 


Or  liave  tlie  Cliristian  bloodliounds  tracked  the  old  lioness  of  Jiidali 
to  her  den  at  last  ?  W ell  see  !  ” 

And  she  drew  a  dagger  from  her  girdle,  and  stepped  boldly  to  the 
door. 

As  she  went  out  she  turned,— 

“So!  my  brave  young  Apollo!  You  do  not  admire  simple  wo¬ 
man?  You  must  have  something  more  learned,  and  intellectual, 
,  and  spiritual,  and  so  forth.  I  wonder  whether  Eve,  when  she  came 
to  Adam  in  the  garden,  brought  with  her  a  certificate  of  proficiency 
in  the  seven  sciences  ?  Well,  well, — like  must  after  like.  Perhaps 
we  shall  be  able  to  suit  you,  after  all.  Vanish,  daughters  of  Mid- 
ian !  ” 

The  girls  vanished  accordingly,  whispering  and  laughing  ;  and 
Philammon  found  himself  alone.  Although  he  was  somewhat 
soothed  by  the  old  woman’s  last  speech,  yet  a  sense  of  terror,  of 
danger,  of  coming  temptation,  kept  him  standing  sternly  on  his  feet, 
looking  warily  round  the  chamber,  lest  a  fresh  siren  should  emerge 
from  behind  some  curtain  or  heap  of  pillows. 

On  one  side  of  the  room  he  perceived  a  doorway,  filled  by  a  curtain 
of  gauze,  from  behind  which  came  the  sound  of  whispering  voices. 
His  fear,  growing  with  the  general  excitement  of  his  mind,  rose  into 
anger  as  he  began  to  suspect  some  snare  ;  and  he  faced  round  toward 
the  curtain,  and  stood  like  a  wild  beast  at  bay,  ready,  with  uplifted 
arm,  for  all  evil  spirits,  male  or  female. 

“  And  he  will  show  himself?  How  shall  I , accost  him  ?  ”  whispered 
a  well-known  voice, — could  it  be  Hypatia’s?  And  then  the  guttural 
Hebrew  accent  of  the  old  woman  answered, — 

“  As  you  spoke  of  him  this  morning - ” 

“  O,  I  will  tell  him  all,  and  he  must — he  must  have  mercy  !  But 
he  ? — so  awful,  so  glorious  !  ” - 

What  the  answer  was,  he  could  not  hear  ;  but  the  next  moment  a 
sweet  heavy  scent,  as  of  narcotic  gums,  filled  the  room, — mutterings 
of  incantations, — and  then  a  blaze  of  light,  in  which  the  curtain  van¬ 
ished,  and  disclosed  to  his  astonished  eyes,  enveloped  in  a  glory  of 
luminous  smoke,  the  hag  standing  by  a  tripod,  and,  kneeling  by  her, 
Hypatia  herself,- robed  in  pure  white,  glittering  with  diamonds  and 
gold,  her  lips  parted,  her  head  thrown  back,  her  arms  stretched  out 
in  an  agony  of  expectation. 

In  an  instant,  before  he  had  time  to  stir,  she  had  sprung  through 
the  blaze,  and  was  kneeling  at  his  feet. 

“  Phoebus  !  beautiful,  glorious,  ever  young  !  Hear  me,  only  a 
moment  !  only  this  once  !  ” 

Her  drapery  had  caught  fire  from  the  tripod,  but  she  did  not  heed 
it.  Philammon  instinctively  clasped  her  in  his  arms,  and  crushed  it 
out,  as  she  cried, — 

“  Have  mercy  on  me  !  Tell  me  the  secret  !  I  will  obey  thee  !  I 
have  no  self, — I  am  thy  slave  !  Kill  me,  if  thou  wilt  :  but  speak  !  ” 


MIRiAM^IS  RLOf.  BO'J' 

The  blaze  sunk  into  a  soft,  warm,  mellow  gleam,  and  beyond  it 
what  appeared? 

The  negro  woman,  with  one  finger  upon  her  lips,  as,  with  an  im¬ 
ploring,  all  but  despairing  look,  slie  held  up  to  him  her  little  crucifix. 

He  saw  it.  What  thoughts  flashed  through  him,  like  the  light¬ 
ning-bolt,  at  that  blessed  sign  of  infinite  self-sacrifice,  I  say  not  ;  let 
those  who  know  it  judge  for  themselves.  But  in  another  instant  he 
had  spurned  from  him  the  poor,  deluded  maiden,  whose  idolatrous 
ecstasies  he  saw  instantly  were  not  meant  for  himself,  and  rushed 
desperately  across  the  room,  looking  for  an  outlet. 

He  found  a  door  in  the  darkness, — a  room, — a  window, — and  in 
another  moment  he  had  leaped  twenty  feet  into  the  street,  rolled 
over,  bruised  and  bleeding,  rose  again  like  an  Antseus,  with  new 
strength,  and  darted  off  toward  the  archbishop’s  house. 

And  poor  Hypatia  lay  half  senseless  on  the  floor,  with  the  Jewess 
watching  her  bitter  tears, — not  merely  of  disappointment,  but  of 
utter  shame.  For  as  Philammon  fled,  she  had  recognized  those  well- 
known  features  ;  and  the  veil  was  lifted  from  her  eyes,  and  the  hope 
and  the  self-respect  of  Theon’s  daughter  were  gone  forever. 

Her  righteous  wrath  was  too  deep  for  upbraidings.  Slowly  she 
rose  ;  returned  into  the  inner  room  ;  wrapped  her  cloak  deliberately 
around  her  ;  and  went  silently  away,  with  one  look  at  the  Jewess  of 
solemn  scorn  and  defiance. 

“Ah  !  I  can  afford  a  few  sulky  looks  to-night  !”  said  the  old 
woman  to  herself,  with  a  smile,  as  she  picked  up  from  the  floor  the 
prize  for  which  she  had  been  plotting  so  long, — Raphael’s  half  of  the 
black  agate. 

‘  ‘  I  wonder  whether  she  will  miss  it !  Perhaps  she  will  have  no 
fancy  for  its  company  any  longer,  now  that  she  has  discovered  what 
over-palpable  archangels  appear  when  she  rubs  it.  But  if  she  does 
try  to  recover  it.  .  .  .why, — let  her  try  her  strength  with  mine  ; — or, 
rather,  with  a  Christian  mob.” 

And  then,  drawing  from  her  bosom  the  other  half  of  the  talisman, 
she  fitted  the  two  pieces  together  again  and  again,  fingering  them 
over,  and  poring  upon  them  with  tear-brimming  eyes,  till  she  had 
satisfied  herself  that  the  fracture  still  fitted  exactly  ;  while  she  mur¬ 
mured  to  herself  from  time  to  time, — “  O  that  he  were  here  1  0  that 
he  would  return  now, — now  !  It  may  be  too  late  to-morrow  !  Stay, — 
I  will  go  and  consult  the  teraph  ;  it  may  know  where  he  is.”.  .  .  . 

And  she  departed  to  her  incantations  ;  while  Hypatia  threw  herself 
upon  her  bed  at  home,  and  filled  the  chamber  with  a  long,  low  wail¬ 
ing,  as  of  a  child  in  pain,  until  the  dreary  dawn  broke  on  her  shame 
and  her  despair.  And  then  she  rose,  and,  rousing  herself  for  one  great 
effort,  calmly  prepared  a  last  oration,  in  which  she  intended  to  bid 
farewell  forever  to  Alexandria  and  to  the  schools. 

Philammon  meanwhile  was  striding  desperately  up  the  main  street 
which  led  toward  the  Serapeium.  But  he  was  not  destined  to  arrive 


m 


MYPATiA. 


tliere  as  soon  as  he  had  hoped  to  do.  For  ere  he  had  gone  half  a 
mile,  behold  a  crowd  advancing  toward  him,  blocking  up  the  whole 
street. 

The  mass  seemed  endless.  Thousands  of  torches  flared  above  their 
heads,  and  from  the  heart  of  the  procession  rose  a  solemn  chant,  in 
which  Philammon  soon  recognized  a  well-known  Catholic  hymn.  He 
was  half  minded  to  turn  up  some  by-street,  and  escape  meeting 
them.  But  on  attempting  to  do  so,  he  found  every  avenue  which 
he  tried  similarly  blocked  up  by  a  tributary  stream  of  people  :  and, 
almost  ere  he  was  aware,  was  entangled  in  the  van-guard  of  the  great 
column. 

“  Let  me  pass  !”  cried  he,  in  a  voice  of  entreaty. 

“  Pass,  thou  heathen?” 

In  vain  he  protested  his  Christianity. 

“  Origenist,  Donatist,  heretic  ?  Whither  should  a  good  Catholic 
be  going  to-night,  save  to  the  Caesareum  ?  ” 

“My  friends,  my  friends,  1  have  no  business  at  the  Csesareum  !” 
cried  he  in  utter  despair.  “  I  am  on  my  way  to  seek  a  private  inter¬ 
view  with  the  patriarch  on  matters  of  importance.” 

‘  ‘  O  liar  !  who  pretends  to  be  known  to  the  patriarch,  and  yet  is 
ignorant  that  this  night  he  visits  at  the  Caesareum  the  most  sacred 
corpse  of  the  martyr  Ammonius  !  ” 

“What  !  Is  Cyril  with  you?” 

“  He  and  all  his  clergy.” 

“  Better  so  ;  better  in  public,”  said  Philammon  to  himself  ;  and, 
turning,  he  joined  the  crowd. 

Onward,  with  chant  and  dirge,  they  swept  out  through  the  Sun- 
gate,  upon  the  harbor-esplanade,  and  wheeled  to  the  right  along  the 
quay,  while  the  torch-light  bathed  in  a  red  glare  the  great  front  of 
the  Caesareum,  and  the  tall  obelisks  before  it,  and  the  masts  of  the 
thousand  ships  which  lay  in  the  harbor  on  their  left  ;  and  last,  but 
not  least,  before  the  huge  dim  mass  of  the  palace  which  bounded  the 
esplanade  in  front,  a  long  line  of  glittering  helmets  and  cuirasses, 
behind  a  barrier  of  cables,  which  stretched  from  the  shore  to  the 
corner  of  the  Museum. 

There  was  a  sudden  halt ;  a  low,  ominous  growl  ;  and  then  the 
mob,  pressed  onward  from  behind,  surged  up  almost  to  the  barrier. 
The  soldiers  dropped  the  points  of  their  lances,  and  stood  firm.  Again 
the  mob  recoiled  ;  again  surged  forward.  Fierce  cries  arose  ;  some 
of  the  boldest  stooped  to  pick  up  stones  ;  but  luckily,  the  pavement 

was  too  firm  for  them . Another  moment,  and  the  whole  soldiery 

of  Alexandria  would  have  been  fighting  for  life  and  death  against 
fifty  thousand  Christians . 

But  Cyril  had  not  forgotten  his  generalship.  Reckless  as  that 
night’s  events  proved  him  to  be  about  arousing  the  passions  of  his 
subjects,  he  was  yet  far  too  wary  to  risk  the  odium  and  the  danger 
of  a  night  attack,  which,  even  if  successful,  would  have  cost  the  lives 


MmiAM’8  PLOT. 


of  hundreds.  He  knew  well  enough  the  numbers  and  the  courage 
of  the  enemy,  and  the  certainty  that,  in  case  of  a  collision,  no  quarter 

would  be  given  or  accepted  on  either  side . Beside,  if  a  battle 

must  take  place, — and  that,  of  course,  must  happen  sooner  or 
later, —  it  must  not  happen  in  his  presence  and  under  his  sanction. 
He  was  in  the  right  now,  and  Orestes  in  the  wrong  ;  and  in  the  right 
he  would  keep, — at  least  till  his  express  from  Byzantium  should  have 
returned,  and  Orestes  was  either  proscribed  or  superseded.  So,  look¬ 
ing  forward  to  some  such  chance  as  this,  the  wary  prelate  had  schooled 
his  aids-de-camp,  the  deacons  of  the  city,  and  went  on  his  way  up 
the  steps  of  the  Csesareum,  knowing  that  they  could  be  trusted  to 
keep  the  peace  outside. 

And  they  did  their  work  well.  Before  a  blow  had  been  struck, 
or  even  an  insult  passed  on  either  side,  they  had  burst  through  the 
front  rank  of  the  mob,  and  by  stout  threats  of  excommunication 
enjoined  not  only  peace,  but  absolute  silence,  until  the  sacred 
ceremony  which  was  about  to  take  place  should  be  completed  ;  and 
enforced  their  commands  by  marching  up  and  down  like  sentries 
between  the  hostile  ranks  for  the  next  weary  two  hours,  till  the  very 
soldiers  broke  out  into  expressions  of  admiration,  and  the  tribune  of 
the  cohort,  who  had  no  great  objection,  but  also  no  great  wish,  to 
fight,  paid  them  a  high-flown  compliment  on  their  laudable  endeavors 
to  maintain  public  order,  and  received  the  somewhat  ambiguous  reply, 
that  the  “weapons  of  their  warfare  were  not  carnal,  that  they 
wrestled  not  against  flesh  and  blood,  but  against  principalities  and 
powers.”.  .  .  .an  answer  which  the  tribune,  being  now  somewhat 
sleepy,  thought  it  best  to  leave  unexplained. 

In  the  meanwhile,  there  had  passed  up  the  steps  of  the  temple  a 
gorgeous  line  of  priests,  among  whom  glittered,  more  gorgeous  than 
all,  the  stately  figure  of  the  pontiff.  They  were  followed  close  by 
thousands  of  monks,  not  only  from  Alexandria  and  Nitria,  but  from 
all  the  adjoining  towns  and  monasteries.  And  as  Philammon,  unable 
for  some  half-hour  more  to  force  his  way  into  the  church,  watched 
their  endless  stream,  he  could  well  believe  the  boast  wdiich  he  had  so 
often  heard  in  Alexandria,  that  one-half  of  the  population  of  Egypt, 
was  at  that  moment  in  “  religious  orders.” 

After  the  monks,  the  laity  began  to  enter  ;  but  even  then  so  vast 
was  the  crowd,  and  so  dense  the  crush  upon  the  steps,  that  befare  he 

could  force  his  way  into  the  church,  Cyril’s  sermon  had  begun. 
***** 

— “  What  w'ent  ye  out  for  to  see  ?  A  man  clothed  in  soft  raiment  ? 
Nay,  such  are  in  kings’  palaces,  and  in  the  palaces  of  prefects  who 
would  needs  be  emperors,  and  cast  away  the  Lord’s  bonds  from  them, 
— of  whom  it  is  written,  that  He  that  sitteth  in  the  heavens  laugheth 
them  to  scorn,  and  takeththe  wicked  in  their  own  snare,  and  maketh 
the  devices  of  princes  of  none  effect.  Ay,  in  kings’  palaces,  and  in 
theaters,  too,  where  the  rich  of  this  world,  poor  in  faith,  deny  their 


BfPATlA. 


§10 

covenant,  and  defile  tlieir  baptismal  robes  that  tbey  may  do  lionor  to 
tlie  devourers  of  tlie  eartli.  Woe  to  tliem  wlio  tliink  that  they  may 
partake  of  the  cup  of  the  Lord  and  the  cup  of  devils  !  Woe  to  them 
who  will  praise  with  the  same  mouth  Aphrodite  the  fiend,  and  her 
of  whom  it  is  written  that  He  was  born  of  a  pure  Virgin.  Let  such 
be  excommunicate  from  the  cup  of  the  Lord,  and  from  the  congrega¬ 
tion  of  the  Lord,  till  they  have  purged  away  their  sins  by  penance 
and  by  almsgiving.  But  for  you,  ye  poor  of  this  world,  rich  in  faith, 
you  whom  the  rich  despise,  haul  before  the  judgment-seats,  and 
blaspheme  that  holy  name  whereby  ye  are  called, — what  went  ye  out 
in  the  wilderness  to  see  ?  A  prophet? — Ay,  and  more  than  a  prophet, 
— a  martyr  !  More  than  a  prophet,  more  than  a  king,  more  than  a 
prefect  :  whose  theater  was  the  sands  of  the  desert,  whose  throne  was 
the  cross,  whose  crown  was  bestowed,  not  by  heathen  philosophers 
and  daughters  of  Satan,  deceiving  men  with  the  works  of  their  fathers, 
but  by  angels  and  archangels  ;  a  crown  of  glory,  the  victor’s  laurel, 
which  grows  forever  in  the  paradise  of  the  highest  heaven.  Call  him 
no  more  Ammonius,  call  bim  Thaumasius,  wonderful  !  Wonderful 
in  his  poverty,  wonderful  in  his  zeal,  wonderful  in  his  faith,  wonder¬ 
ful  in  his  fortitude,  wonderful  in  his  death,  most  wonderful  in  the 
manner  of  that  death.  O  thrice  blessed,  who  has  merited  the  honor 
of  the  cross  itself  !  What  can  follow,  but  that  one  so  honored  in  the 
flesh  should  also  be  honored  in  the  life  which  he  now  lives,  and  that 
from  the  virtue  of  these  thrice -holy  limbs  the  leper  should  be 
cleansed,  the  dumb  should  speak,  the  very  dead  be  raised  ?  Yes  ;  it 
were  impiety  to  doubt  it.  Consecrated  by  the  cross,  this  flesh  sliMl- 
not  only  rest  in  hope,  but  work  in  power.  Approach,  and  be  healed  1 
Approach,  and  see  the  glory  of  the  saints,  the  glory  of  the  poor  1 
Approach,  and  learn  that  that  which  man  despises,  God  hath  highly 
esteemed  ;  that  that  which  man  rejects,  God  accepts  ;  that  that  which 
man  punishes,  God  rewards.  Approach,  and  see  how  God  hath 
chosen  the  foolish  things  of  this  world  to  confound  the  wise,  and  the 
weak  things  of  this  world  to  confound, the  strong.  Man  abhors  the 
cross  :  the  Son  of  God  condescended  to  endure  it  !  Man  tramples  on 
the  poor  :  the  Son  of  God  hath  not  where  to  lay  his  head.  Man 
passes  by  the  sick  as  useless  :  the  Son  of  God  chooses  them  to  be  par¬ 
takers  of  his  sufferings,  that  the  glory  of  God  may  be  made  manifest 
in  them.  Man  curses  the  publican,  while  he  employs  him  to  fill  his 
coffers  with  the  plunder  of  the  poor  ;  the  Son  of  God  calls  him  from 
the  receipt  of  custom  to  be  an  Apostle,  higher  than  the  kings  of  the 
earth.  Man  casts  away  the  harlot  like  a  faded  flowmr,  when  he  has 
tempted  her  to  become  the  slave  of  sin  for  a  season  :  and  the  Son  of 
God  calls  her,  the  defiled,  the  despised,  the  forsaken,  to  Himself, 
accepts  her  tears,  blesses  her  offering,  and  declares  that  her  sins  are 
forgiven,  for  she  hath  loved  much  :  while  to  whom  little  is  forgiven 
the  same  loveth  little.”  .... 

Philammon  heard  no  more.  With  the  passionate  and  impulsive 


Mirtam’8  Plot. 


811 


nature  of  a  Greek  fanatic,  lie  burst  forward  tlirougli  the  crowd, 
toward  the  steps  which  led  to  the  choir,  and  above  which,  in  front  of 
the  altar,  stood  the  corpse  of  Amnionius  inclosed  in  a  coffin  of  glass, 
beneath  a  gorgeous  canopy  ;  and,  never  stopping  till  he  found  him¬ 
self  in  front  of  Cyril’s  pulpit,  he  threw  himself  upon  his  face  upon 
the  pavement,  spread  out  his  arms  in  the  form  of  a  cross,  and  lay  si¬ 
lent  and  motionless  before  the  feet  of  the  multitude. 

There  was  a  sudden  whisper  and  rustle  in  the  congregation  :  but 
Cyril,  after  a  moment’s  pause,  went  on, — 

“Man,  in  his  pride  and  self-sufficiency,  despises  humiliation,  aud 
penance,  and  the  broken  and  the  contrite  heart ;  and  tells  thee  that 
only  as  long  as  thou  doest  well  unto  thyself  will  he  speak  well  of 
thee  :  the  Son  of  God  says  that  he  that  humbleth  himself,  even  as 
this  our  penitent  brother,  he  it  is  who  shall  be  exalted  ;  he  it  is  of 
whom  it  is  written  that  his  father  saw  him  afar  off,  and  ran  to  meet 
him,  and  bade  put  the  best  robe  on  him,  and  a  ring  on  his  hand,  and 
shoes  on  his  feet,  and  make  merry  and  be  glad  with  the  choir  of  an¬ 
gels  who  rejoice  over  one  sinner  that  repenteth.  Arise,  my  son,  who. 
soever  thou  art  ;  aud  go  in  peace  for  this  night,  remembering  that  he 
who  said,  ‘My  belly  cleaveth  unto  the  pavement,’  hath  said  also, 
‘  Rejoice  not  against  me,  Satan,  mine  enemy,  for  when  I  fall  I  shall 
arise  !  ’  ” 

A  thunderclap  of  applause,  surely  as  pardonable  as  any  an  Alexan¬ 
drian  church  ever  heard,  followed  this  dexterous,  and  yet  most  right¬ 
eous,  turn  of  the  patriarch’s  oratory  :  but  Philammon  raised  himself 
slowly  and  fearfully  to  his  knees,  and,  blushing  scarlet,  endured  the 
gaze  of  ten  thousand  eyes. 

Suddenly,  from  beside  the  pulpit,  an  old  man  sprung  forward, 
and  clasped  him  round  the  neck.  It  was  Arsenins. 

“  My  son  !  my  son  !”  sobbed  he,  almost  aloud. 

“  Slave,  as  well  as  son,  if  you  will  !  ”  whispered  Philammon. 
“One  boon  from  the  patriarch,  and  then  home  to  the  Laura  for¬ 
ever  !”.... 

“  O  twice-blessed  night,”  rolled  on  above  the  deep,  rich  voice  of 
Cyril,  “  which  beholds  at  once  the  coronation  of  a  martyr  and  the 
conversion  of  a  sinner  ;  wdiich  increases  at  the  same  time  the  ranks 
of  the  Church  triumphant  and  of  the  Church  militant,  and  pierces 
celestial  essences  with  a  twofold  rapture  of  thanksgiving,  as  they 
welcome  on  high  a  victorious,  and  on  earth  a  repentant  brother  !  ” 

And,  at  a  sign  from  Cyril,  Peter  the  Reader  stepped  forward,  and 
led  away,  gently  enough,  the  two  weepers,  who  were  welcomed  as 
they  passed  by  the  blessings,  and  prayers,  and  tears  even  of  those 
fierce  fanatics  of  Nitria.  Nay,  Peter  himself,  as  he  turned  to  leave 
them  together  in  the  sacristy,  held  out  his  hand  to  Philammon. 

“  I  ask  your  forgiveness,”  said  the  poor  boy,  Avdio  plunged  eagerly 
and  with  a  sort  of  delight  into  any  and  every  self-abasement. 

“  And  I  accord  it,”  quoth  Peter  ;  and  returned  to  the  church,  look- 
ing,  and  probably  feeling,  in  a  far  more  pleasant  mood  than  usual. 


CHAPTER  XXVII. 

THE  prodigal’s  RETURN. 

About  ten  o’clock  tlie  next  morning,  as  Hypatia,  worn  out  witli 
sleepless  sorrow,  was  trying  to  arrange  lier  tliouglits  for  tlie  farewell 
lecture,  lier  favorite  maid  announced  tliat  a  messenger  from  Synesius 
waited  below,  A  letter  from  Synesius  ?  A  gleam  of  hope  flashed 
across  her  mind.  From  him,  surely,  might  come  something  of  com¬ 
fort,  of  advice.  Ah  !  if  he  only  knew  how  sorely  she  was  bested  ! 

Let  him  send  up  his  letter.” 

He  refuses  to  deliver  it  to  any  one  but  yourself.  And  I  think,” 
— added  the  damsel,  who  had,  to  tell  the  truth,  at  that  moment  in 
her  purse  a  substantial  reason  for  so  thinking, — ‘  ‘  I  think  it  might  be 
worth  your  ladyship’s  while  to  see  him.” 

Hypatia  shook  her  head  impatiently. 

“He  seems  to  know  you  well,  madam,  though  he  refuses  to  tell 
his  name  ;  but  he  bade  me  put  you  in  mind  of  a  black  agate, — I  can¬ 
not  tell  what  he  meant, — of  a  black  agate,  and  a  spirit  which  was  to 
appear  when  you  rubbed  it.” 

Hypatia  turned  pale  as  death.  Was  it  Philammon  again?  She 
felt  for  the  talisman, — it  was  gone  !  She  must  have  lost  it  last  night 
in  Miriam’s  chamber.  Now  she  saw  the  true  purpose  of  the  old 
hag's  plot, — .  . .  .deceived,  tricked,  doubly  tricked  !  And  what  new 
plot  was  this? 

“  Tell  him  to  leave  the  letter  and  be  gone . My  father  ?  What  ? 

Who  is  this  ?  Whom  are  you  bringing  to  me  at  such  a  moment?” 

And  as  she  spoke,  Theon  ushered  into  the  chamber  no  other  than 
Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  and  then  retired. 

He  advanced  slowly  toward  her,  and,  falling  on  one  knee,  placed 
in  her  hand  Synesius’s  letter, 

Hypatia  trembled  from  head  to  foot  at  the  unexpected  apparition. 
...  .Well ;  at  least  he  could  know  nothing  of  last  night  and  its  dis¬ 
grace.  But  not  dar?ng  to  look  him  in  the  face,  she  took  the  letter, 

and  opened  it . If  she  had  hoped  for  comfort  from  it,  her  hope 

was  not  realized. 

“  Synesius  to  the  Philosopher  : — 

“  Even  if  fortune  cannot  take  from  me  all  things,  yet  what  she 
can  take  she  will.  And  yet  of  two  things,  at  least,  she  shall  not  rob 
me, — to  prefer  that  which  is  best,  and  to  succor  the  oppressed. 
Heaven  forbid  that  she  should  overpower  my  judgment,  as  well  as 

(313) 


THE  PR0DIGAE8  RETURN. 


313 


tlie  rest  of  me  !  Therefore  I  do  liate  injustice  ;  for  that  I  can  do  ; 
and  my  will  is  to  stop  it ;  but  the  power  to  do  so  is  among  the  things 
of  which  she  has  bereaved  me, — before,  too,  she  bereaved  me  of  my 
children . 

‘Once,  in  old  times,  Milesian  men  were  strong.’ 

And  there  was  a  time  when  I,  too,  was  a  comfort  to  my  friends,  and 
when  you  used  to  call  me  a  blessing  to  every  one  except  myself,  as  I 
squandered  for  the  benefit  of  others  the  favors  with  which  the  great 

regarded  me . My  hands  they  were — then . But  now  I  am  left 

desolate  of  all  :  unless  you  have  any  power.  For  you  and  virtue  I 
count  among  those  good  things  of  which  none  can  deprive  me.  But 
you  always  have  power,  and  will  have  it,  surely,  now, — using  it  as 
nobly  as  you  do. 

“As  for  Nicaeus  and  Philolaus,  two  noble  youths,  and  kinsmen  of 
my  own,  let  it  be  the  business  of  all  who  honor  you,  both  private 
men  and  magistrates,  to  see  that  they  return  possessors  of  their  just 
rights.  ” 

“  Of  all  who  honor  me  !  ”  said  she,  with  a  bitter  sigh  ;  and  then 
looked  up  quickly  at  Raphael,  as  if  fearful  of  having  betrayed  her¬ 
self.  She  turned  deadly  pale.  In  his  eyes  was  a  look  of  solemn 
pity,  which  told  her  that  he  knew — not  all  ? — surely  not  ail  ? 

“  Have  you  seen  the — Miriam  ?”  gasped  she,  rushing  desperately 
at  that  which  she  most  dreaded. 

“Not  yet.  I  arrived  but  one  hour  ago  ;  and  Hypatia’s  welfare  is 
still  more  important  to  me  than  my  own.” 

‘  ‘  My  welfare  ?  It  is  gone  !  ” 

‘  ‘  So  much  the  better.  I  never  found  mine  till  I  lost  it.  ” 

“  What  do  you  mean  ?  ” 

Raphael  lingered,  yet  without  withdrawing  his  gaze,  as  if  he  had 
something  of  importance  to  say,  which  he  longed  and  yet  feared  to 
utter.  At  last, — 

“  At  least  you  will  confess  that  I  am  better  dressed  than  when  we 
met  last.  I  have  returned,  you  see,  like  a  certain  demoniac  of 
Gadara,  about  whom  we  used  to  argue,  clothed, — and  perhaps  also 
in  my  right  mind . God  knows  1  ” 

“  Raphael !  are  you  come  here  to  mock  me?  You  know — you  can¬ 
not  have  been  here  an  hour  without  knowing — that  but  yesterday  I 
dreamed  of  being” — and  she  dropped  her  eyes — “  an  empress  ;  that 
to-day  I  am  ruined  ;  to-morrow,  perhaps,  proscribed.  Have  you  no 
speech  for  me  but  your  old  sarcasms  and  ambiguities  ?  ” 

Raphael  stood  silent  and  motionless. 

“Why  do  you  not  speak?  What  is  the  meaning  of  this  sad, 
earnest  look,  so  different  from  your  former  self?. . .  .You  have  some¬ 
thing  strange  to  tell  me  !  ” 

“  I  have/’  said  he,  speaking  very  slowly.  “  WJiat — what  would 


314 


HYPATIA. 


Hypatia  answer,  if,  after  all,  Aben-Ezra  said,  like  the  dying  Julian, 
‘  The  Galilsean  Las  conquered  ?  ’  ” 

“  Julian  never  said  it  !  It  is  a  monkish,  calumny.” 

“But  I  say  it.” 

“  Impossible  !” 

“  I  say  it  !  ” 

“  As  your  dying  speech  ?  The  true  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  then,  lives 
no  more  \  ” 

“  But  he  may  be  born  again.” 

“  And  die  to  philosophy,  that  he  may  be  born  again  into  barbaric 
superstition  I  O  worthy  metempsychosis  !  Farewell,  sir  !  ”  And 
she  rose  to  go. 

“  Hear  me  ! — hear  me  patiently  this  once,  noble,  beloved  Hypatia  ! 
One  more  sneer  of  yours,  and  I  may  become  again  the  same 
case-hardened  fiend  which  you  knew  me  of  old — to  all,  at  least, 
but  you.  0,  do  not  think  me  ungrateful,  forgetful  !  What  do  I  not 
owe  to  you,  whose  pure  and  lofty  w'ords  alone  kept  smoldering  in 
me  the  dim  remembrance  that  there  was  a  Right,  a  Truth,  an  unseen 
world  of  spirits,  after  whose  pattern  man  should  aspire  to  live?” 

She  paused,  and  listened  in  wonder.  What  faith  had  she  of  her 
own  ?  She  would  at  least  hear  what  he  had  found . 

“  Hypatia,  I  am  older  than  you, — wiser  than  you,  if  wisdom  be  the 
fruit  of  the  tree  of  knowledge.  You  know  but  one  side  of  the  medal, 
Hypatia,  and  the  fairer  ;  I  have  seen  its  reverse  as  W’ell  as  its  ob¬ 
verse.  Through  every  form  of  human  thought,  of  human  action,  of 
human  sin  and  folly,  have  I  been  wandering  for  years,  and  found  no 
rest, — as  little  in  wisdom  as  in  folly,  in  spiritualist  dreams  as  in 
sensual  brutality.  I  could  not  rest  in  your  Platonism, — I  will  tell 
you  why  hereafter.  I  went  on  to  Stoicism,  Epicurism,  Cynicism,  Skep¬ 
ticism,  and  in  that  lowest  deej:)  I  found  a  lower  depth,  when  I  became 
skeptical  of  Skepticism  itself.” 

“  There  is  a  lower  deep  still,”  thought  Hypatia  to  herself,  as  she 
recollected  last  night’s  magic  ;  but  she  did  not  speak. 

“Then,  in  utter  abasement,  I  confessed  myself  lower  than  the 
brutes,  who  had  a  law,  and  obeyed  it,  while  I  was  my  own  lawless 

God,  devil,  harpy,  whirlwind . I  needed  even  my  own  dog  to 

awaken  in  me  the  brute  consciousness  of  my  own  existence,  or  of 
anything  without  myself.  I  took  her,  the  dog,  for  my  teacher,  and 
obeyed  her,  for  she  was  wiser  than  I.  And  she  led  me  back, — the 
poor  dumb  beast, — like  a  God-sent  and  God-obeying  angel,  to  human 
nature,  to  mercy,  to  self-sacrifice,  to  belief,  to  worship, — to  pure  and 
wedded  love.” 

Hypatia  started . And,  in  the  struggle  to  hide  her  own  be¬ 

wilderment,  answered  almost  without  knowing  it, — 

“Wedded  love? . Wedded  love?  Is  that,  then,  the  paltry 

bait  by  which  Raphael  Aben-Ezra  has  been  tempted  to  desert  phil¬ 
osophy  ?  ” 


THE  riiODIGAES  RETURN. 


315 


“  Thank  Heaven  !  ”  said  Raphael  to  himself.  She  does  not  care 
for  me,  then  !  If  she  had,  pride  would  have  kept  her  from  that 
sneer.  Yes,  my  dear  lady,”  answered  he,  aloud,  “to  desert  phil¬ 
osophy,  the  search  after  wisdom  ;  because  wisdom  itself  had  sought 
for  me,  and  found  me.  But,  indeed,  I  had  hoped  that  you  would 
have  approved  of  my  following  your  example  for  once  in  my  life, 
and  resolving,  like  you,  to  enter  into  the  estate  of  wedlock.” 

“Do  not  sneer  at  me!”  cried  she,  in  her  turn,  looking  up  at 
him  with  shame  and  horror,  which  made  him  repent  of  uttering  the 
words.  “  If  you  do  not  know,  you  will  soon,  too  soon  !  Never 
mention  that  hateful  dream  to  me,  if  you  wish  to  have  speech  of  me 
more  1  ” 

A  pang  of  remorse  shot  through  Raphael's  heart.  Who  but  he 
himself  had  plotted  that  evil  marriage  ?  But  she  gave  him  no  op¬ 
portunity  of  answering  her,  and  went  on  hurriedly, — 

“  Speak  to  me  rather  about  yourself.  What  is  this  strange  and 
sudden  betrothal  ?  What  has  it  to  do  with  Christianity  ?  I  had 
thought  that  it  was  rather  by  the  glories  of  celibacy — gross  and  su¬ 
perstitious  as  their  notions  of  it  are — that  the  (ialilaeans  tempted 
their  converts.” 

'  “  So  had  I,  my  dearest  lady,”  answered  he,  as,  glad  to  turn  the 
subject  for  a  moment,  and  perhaps  a  little  nettled  by  her  contemptu¬ 
ous  tone,  he  resumed  something  of  his  old  arch  and  careless  maimer. 
“But — there  is  no  accounting  for  man’s  agreeable  inconsistencies — 
one  morning  I  found  myself,  to  my  astonishment,  seized  by  two 
bishops,  and  betrothed,  whether  I  chose  or  not,  to  a  young  lady  who 
but  a  few  days  before  had  been  destined  for  a  nunnery.” 

“Two  bishops  ?  ” 

“  I  speak  simple  truth.  The  one  was  Synesius,  of  course  ; — that 
most  incoherent  and  most  benevolent  of  busy-bodies  chose  to  betray 
me  behind  my  back  : — but  I  will  not  trouble  you  with  that  part  of  my 
story.  The  real  wonder  is,  that  the  other  episcopal  match-maker  was 
— Augustine  of  Hippo  himself  1  ” 

“  Anything  to  bribe  a  convert,”  said  Hypatia  contemptuously. 

“  I  assure  you,  no.  He  informed  me,  and  her  also,  openly  and  un¬ 
civilly  enough,  that  he  thought  us  very  much  to  be  pitied  for  so  great 

a  fall . But  as  we  neither  of  us  seemed  to  have  any  call  for  the 

higher  life  of  celibacy,  he  could  not  press  it  on  us . We  should 

have  trouble  in  the  flesh.  But  if  we  married,  we  had  not  sinned. 
To  which  I  answered  that  my  humility  was  quite  content  to  sit  in  the 

very  lowest  ranks,  with  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob . He  replied  by 

an  encomium  on  virginity,  in  which  I  seemed  to  hear  again  the  voice 
of  Hypatia  herself.” 

“  And  sneered  at  it  inwardly,  as  you  used  to  sneer  at  me.” 

“  Really,  I  was  in  no  sneering  mood  at  that  moment  ;  and  whatso¬ 
ever  I  may  have  felt  inclined  to  reply,  he  was  kind  enough  to  sa^  for 
me  and  himself  the  next  minute,” 


316 


HYPATIA. 


“  Wliat  do  you  mean  ?  ” 

“He  went  on,  to  my  utter  astonishment,  by  such  an  eulogium  on 
wedlock  as  I  never  heard  from  Jew  or  heathen,  and  ended  by  advice 
to  young  married  folk  so  thoroughly  excellent  and  to  the  point  that  I 
could  not  help  telling  him,  when  he  stopped,  what  a  pity  I  thought 
it  that  he  had  not  himself  married,  and  made  some  good  woman  hap- 
py  by  putting  his  own  recipes  into  practice  ....  And  at  that,  Hypatia, 

I  saw  an  expression  on  his  face  which  made  me  wish  for  the  .moment 
that  I  had  bitten  out  this  impudent  tongue  of  mine,  before  I  so  rashly 

touched  some  deep  old  wound . That  man  has  wept  bitter  tears  ere 

now,  be  sure  of  it . But  he  turned  the  conversation  instantly,  like 

a  well-bred  gentleman  as  he  is,  by  saying,  with  the  sweetest  smile, 
that,  though  he  had  made  it  a  solemn  rule  never  to  be  a  party  to 
making  up  any  marriage,  yet  in  our  case  Heavem  had  so  plainly 
pointed  us  out  for  each  other,  etc. ,  etc. ,  that  he  could  not  refuse  him¬ 
self  the  pleasure,. . .  .and  ended  by  a  ble^^ing  as  kindly  as  ever  came 
from  the  lips  of  man.” 

“You  seem  wonderfully  taken  with  the  sophist  of  Hippo,”  said 
Hypatia,  impatiently  ;  ‘  ‘  and  forget,  perhaps,  that  his  opinions, 
especially  when,  as  you  confess,  they  are  utterly  inconsistent  with 
themselves,  are  not  quite  as  important  to  me -as  they  seem  to  have 
become  to  vou.” 

“  Whether  he  be  consistent  or  not  about  marriage,”  said  Raphael, 
somewhat  proudly,  “I  care  little.  1  went  to  him  to  tell  me,  not 
about  the  relation  of  the  sexes,  on  which  point  I  am  probably  as  good 
a  judge  as  he, — but  about  God;  and  on  that  subject  he  told  me 
enough  to  bring  me  back  to  Alexandria,  that  I  might  undo,  if  possible, 
somewhat  of  the  wrong  which  I  have  done  to  Hypatia.” 

“  What  wrong  have  you  done  me?.  .  .  .You  are  silent  ?  Be  sure,  at 
least,  that,  whatsoever  it  may  be,  you  will  not  wipe  it  out  by  trying 
to  make  a  proselyte  of  me  !  ” 

“  Be  not  too  sure  of  that.  I  have  found  too  great  a  treasure  not  to 
wish  to  share  it  with  Theon’s  daughter.” 

“  A  treasure?”  said  she,  half  scornfully. 

“  Yes,  indeed.  You  recollect  my  last  words,  when  we  parted  there 
below  a  few  months  ago  ?  ” 

Hypatia  was  silent.  One  terrible  pos?ibility  at  which  he  had  hinted 
flashed  across  her  memory  for  the  first  time  since  ;. . .  .but  she  spurn 
ed  proudly  from  her  the  heaven-sent  warning. 

“  I  told  you  that,  like  Diogenes,  I  vent  forth  to  seek  a  man.  Did 
I  not  promise  you,  that,  when  I  l)9d  found  one,  you  should  be  the 
first  to  hear  of  him  ?  And  I  have  found  a  man.” 

Hypatia  waved  her  beauti  ful  hand.  ‘  ‘  I  know  whom  you  would 
say.  . .  .that  crucified  one.  Be  it  so.  I  want  not  a  man,  but  a  god.” 

“  What  sort  of  a  god,  Hypatia  t  A  god  made  up  of  our  own  intel¬ 
lectual  notions, or  rather  of  negations  of  them, — of  infinity,  and  eter¬ 
nity,  and  invisibility,  and  imyrtssibility, — and  why  not  of  immorality, 


THE  PRODIGALS  RETURH. 


317 


too,  Hypatia  ?  For  I  recollect  we  used  to  agree  that  it  was  a  carnal 
degrading  of  the  Supreme  One  to  predicate  of  him  so  merely  human  a 
thing  as  virtue.” 

Hypatia  was  -silent. 

“  Now  I  have  always  had  a  sort  of  fancy,  that  what  we  wanted, 
as  the  first  predicate  of  our  Absolute  One,  was  that  he  was  to  be  not 
merely  an  infinite  God, — whatever  that  meant,  which  I  suspect  we 
did  not  always  see  quite  clearly, — or  an  eternal  one, — or  an  omnipotent 
one, — or  even  merely  a  one  God  at  all ; — none  of  which  predicates,  I 
fear,  did  we  understand  more  clearly  than  the  first  ;  but  that  he  must 
be  a  righteous  God  : — or  rather,  as  we  used  sometimes  to  say  that  he 
was  to  have  no  predicate, — Righteousness  itself.  And  all  along,  I 
could  not  help  remembering  that  my  old  sacred  Hebrew  books  told 
me  of  such  a  one  ;  and  feeling  that  they  might  have  something  to 
tell  me  whicli - ” 

“  Which  1  did  not  tell  you  !  And  this,  then,  caused  your  air  of 
reserve,  and  of  sly  superiority  over  the  woman  whom  you  mocked  by 
calling  her  your  pupil  !  I  little  suspected  you  of  so  truly  Jewish  a 
jealousy  !  Why,  0,  why  did  you  not  tell  me  this  ?  ” 

“Because  I  was  a  beast,  Hypatia  ,  and  had  all  but  forgotten  what 
this  righteousness  was  like  ;  and  was  afraid  to  find  out,  lest  it  should 
condemn  me.  Because  I  was  a  devil,  Hypatia  ;  and  hated  righteous¬ 
ness,  and  neither  wished  to  see  you  righteous,  nor  God  righteous 
either,  because  then  you  would  both  have  been  unlike  myself.  God 
be  merciful  to  me  a  sinner  !  ” 

Bhe  looked  up  in  his  face.  The  man  was  changed  as  if  by  miracle, 
— and  yet  not  changed.  There  was  the  same  gallant  consciousness  of 
power,  the  same  subtle  and  humorous  twinkle  in  those  strong,  ripe, 
Jewish  features  and  those  glittering  eyes  ;  and  yet  every  line  in  his 
face  was  softened,  sweetened  ;  the  mask  of  sneering  faineance  was 
gone, — imploring  tenderness  and  earnestness  beamed  from  his  whole 
countenance.  The  chrysalis  case  had  fallen  off,  and  disclosed  the 
butterfiy  within.  She  sat  looking  at  him,  and  passed  her  hand  across 
her  eyes,  as  if  to  try  whether  the  apparition  would  not  vanish.  He, 
the  subtle  ! — he,  the  mocker  ! — he,  the  Lucian  of  Alexandria  ! — he, 
whose  depth  and  power  had  awed  her,  even  in  his  most  polluted  days. 

. . .  .And  this  was  the  end  of  him . 

“  It  is  a  freak  of  cowardly  superstition . Those  Christians  have 

been  frightening  him  about  his  sins  and  their  Tartarus.” 

She  looked  again  into  his  bright,  clear,  fearless  face,  and  was 
ashamed  of  her  own  calumny.  And  this  was  the  end  of  him, — of 
Synesius, — of  Augustine, — of  learned  and  unlearned,  Goth  and  Ro¬ 
man . The  great  flood  would  have  its  way,  then . Could  she 

alone  fight  against  it  ? 

She  would  !  Would  she  submit? — She?  Her  will  should  stand 

firm,  her  reason  free,  to  the  last, — to  the  death  if  need  be . And  yet 

last  night ! — last  night  ! 


318 


HYPATIA. 


At  last  she  spoke,  without  looking  up. 

“  And  what  if  you  have  found  a  man  in  that  crucified  one  ?  Have 
you  found  in  him  a  God  also?” 

“  Does  Hypatia  recollect  Glaucon’s  definition  of  the  perfectly 
righteous  man  ?. . .  .How,  without  being  guilty  of  one  unrighteous 
act,  he  must  labor  his  life  long  under  the  imputation  of  being  utterly 
unrighteous,  in  order  that  his  disinterestedness  may  be  thoroughly 
tested,  and,  by  proceeding  in  such  a  course,  arrive  inevitably,  as 
Glaucon  says,  not  only  in  Athens  of  old,  or  in  Judsea  of  old,  but,  as 
you  yourself  will  agree,  in  Christian  Alexandria  at  this  moment,  at 
— do  you  remember, Hypatia  ? — bonds  and  the  scourge,  and  lastly,  at 

the  cross  itself . If  Plato’s  idea  of  the  righteous  man  be  a  crucified 

one,  why  may  not  mine  also  ?  If,  as  we  both,  and  old  Bishop  Clemens, 
too, — as  good  a  Platonist  as  we,  remember, — and  Augustine  himself, 
would  agree,  Plato,  in  speaking  those  strange  words,  spoke  not  of 
himself,  but  by  the  Spirit  of  God,  why  should  not  others  have  spoken 
by  the  same  Spirit  when  they  spoke  the  same  words  ?” 

A  crucified  man . Yes.  But  a  crucified  God,  Raphael  !  I 

shudder  at  the  blasphemy.” 

“So  do  my  poor,  dear  fellow-countrymen.  Are  they  the  more 
righteous  in  their  daily  doings,  Hypatia,  on  account  of  their  fancied 
reference  for  the  glory  of  One  who  probably  knows  best  how  to 
preserve  and  manifest  his  own  glory  ?  But  you  assent  to  the  definition  ? 
Take  care  !”  said  he,  with  one  of  his  arch  smiles,  “  I  have  been 
fighting  with  Augustine,  and  have  become  of  late  a  terrible  dialec¬ 
tician.  Do  you  assent  to  it  ?  ” 

“  Of  course, — it  is  Plato’s.” 

“  But  do  you  assent  merely  because  it  is  written  in  the  book  called 
Plato’s,  or  because  your  reason  tells  you  that  it  is  true  ?. . .  .You  will 
not  tell  me.  Tell  me  this,  then,  at  least.  Is  not  the  perfectly 
righteous  man  the  highest  specimen  of  men  ?  ” 

“  Surely,”  said  she,  half  carelessly  :  but  not  unwilling,  like  a 
philosopher  and  a  Greek,  as  a  matter  of  course,  to  embark  in  any¬ 
thing  like  a  word-battle,  and  to  shut  out  sadder  thoughts  for  a 
moment. 

“  Then  must  not  the  Autanthropos,  the  archetypal  and  ideal  man, 
who  is  more  perfect  than  any  individual  specimen,  be  perfectly 
righteous  also  ?  ” 

“  Yes.” 

“  Suppose,  then,  for  the  sake  of  one  of  those  pleasant  old  games  of 
ours,  an  argument,  that  he  wished  to  manifest  his  righteousness  to 

the  world . The  only  method  for  him,  according  to  Plato,  would 

be  Glaucon’s,  of  calumny  and  persecution,  the  scourge  and  the 
cross  ?  ” 

“  What  words  are  these,  Raphael  ?  Material  scourges  and  crosses 
for  an  eternal  and  spiritual  idea  ?  ” 

“Did  you  ever  yet,  Hypatia,  consider  at  leisure  what  the  arche¬ 
type  of  man  might  be  like  ?  ” 


THE  PRODIGAL’S  RETURJL.  319 

Hypatia  started,  as  at  a  new  tliouglit,  and  confessed — as  every 
Neo-Platonist  would  have  done — that  she  had  never  done  so. 

“  And  yet  our  master,  Plato,  bade  us  believe  that  there  was  a  sub¬ 
stantial  archetype  of  each  thing,  from  a  flower  to  a  nation,  eternal  in 
the  heavens.  Perhaps  we  have  not  been  faithful  Platonists  enough, 
heretofore,  my  dearest  tutor.  Perhaps,  being  philosophers,  and 
somewhat  of  Pharisees  to  boot,  we  began  all  our  lucubrations  as  we 
did  our  prayers,  by  thanking  God  that  we  were  not  as  other  men 
were  ;  and  so  misread  another  passage  in  the  Republic,  which  we 
used  in  pleasant  old  days  to  be  fond  of  quoting.” 

“What  was  that?”  asked  Hypatia,  who  became  more  and  more 
interested  every  moment. 

“  That  philosophers  were  men.” 

“Are  you  mocking  me?  Plato  defines  the  philosopher  as  the  man 
who  seeks  after  the  objects  of  knowledge,  while  others  seek  after 
those  of  opinion.” 

“  And  most  truly.  But  what  if,  in  our  eagerness  to  assert  that 
wherein  the  philosopher  differed  from  other  men,  we  had  overlooked 
that  in  which  he  resembled  other  men  ;  and  so  forgot  that,  after  all, 
man  was  a  genus  whereof  the  philosopher  was  only  a  species  ?  ” 

Hypatia  sighed. 

“  Do  you  not  think,  then,  that  as  the  greater  contains  the  less,  and 
the  archetype  of  the  genus  that  of  the  species,  we  should  have  been 
wiser  if  we  had  speculated  a  little  more  on  the  archetype  of  man  as 
man,  before  we  meddled  with  a  part  of  that  archetype, — the  arche¬ 
type  of  the  philosopher?. . .  .Certainly  it  would  have  been  the  easier 
course,  for  there  are  more  men  than  philosophers,  Hypatia  ;  and 
every  man  is  a  real  man,  and  a  fair  subject  for  examination,  while 
every  philosopher  is  not  a  real  philosopher, — our  friends  the  Academ¬ 
ics,  for  instance,  and  even  a  Neo-Platonist  or  two  whom  we  know? 
You  seem  impatient.  Shall  I  cease  ?  ” 

“  You  mistook  the  cause  of  my  impatience,”  answered  she,  looking 
up  at  him  with  her  great,  sad  eyes.  “  Go  on.” 

“Now, — for  I  am  going  to  be  terribly  scholastic, — is  it  not  the 
very  definition  of  man,  that  he  is,  alone  of  all  known  things,  a  spirit 
temporarily  united  to  an  animal  body?” 

“  Enchanted  in  it,  as  in  a  dungeon,  rather,”  said  she,  sighing. 

“  Be  it  so,  if  you  will.  But  must  we  not  say  that  the  archetype — 
the  very  man — that  if  he  is  the  archetype,  he  too  will  be,  or  must 
have  been,  once  at  least,  temporarily  enchanted  into  an  animal  body? 

. . .  .You  are  silent.  I  will  not  press  you.  . .  .Only  ask  you  to  consider 
at  your  leisure  whether  Plato  may  not  justify  somewhat  from  the 
charge  of  absurdity  the  fisherman  of  Galilee,  where  he  said  that  He 
in  whose  image  man  is  made  was  made  flesh,  and  dwelt  with  him 
bodily  there  by  the  lake-side  at  Tiberias,  and  that  he  beheld  his 
glory,  the  glory  as  of  the  only  begotten  of  the  Father.” 

“  That  last  question  is  a  very  dijfierent  one.  God  made  flesh  !  My 
reason  revolts  at  it.” 


820 


HYPATIA. 


“  Old  Homer’s  reason  did  not.” 

Hypatia  started,  for  slie  recollected^ her  yesterday’s  cravings  after 
those  old,  palpable,  and  human  deities.  And — ”  Go  on,”  she  cried, 
eagerly. 

“  Tell  me,  then — This  archetype  of  man,  if  it  exists  anywhere,  it 
must  exist  eternally  in  the  mind  of  God  ?  At  least,  Plato  would  have 
so  said  ?  ” 

“  Yes.” 

“  And  derive  its  existence  immediately  from  Hini?” 

“  Yes.” 

“But  a  man  is  one  willing  person,  unlike  to  all  others.” 

“  Yes.” 

“  Then  this  archetype  must  be  such.” 

“  I  suppose  so.” 

“  But  possessing  the  faculties  and  properties  of  all  men  in  their 
highest  perfection.” 

“  Of  course.” 

“How  sweetly  and  obediently  my  late  teacher  becomes  my  pu 
pil  !  ” 

Hypatia  looked  at  him  with  her  eyes  full  of  tears. 

“I  never  taught  you  anything,  Baphael.” 

“  You  taught  me  most,  beloved  lady,  when  you  least  thought  of  it. 
But  tell  me  one  thing  more.  Is  it  not  the  property  of  every  man  to 
be  a  son?  For  you  can  conceive  of  a  man  as  not  being  a  father,  but 
not  as  not  being  a  son.” 

“  Be  it  so.” 

“  Then  this  archetype  must  be  a  son  also.” 

“  Whose  son,  Raphael  ?” 

“  Why  not  of  ‘  Zeus,  father  of  gods  and  men  ?  ’  For  we  agreed  that 
it — we  will  call  it  he,  now,  having  agreed  that  it  is  a  person — • 
could  owe  his  existence  to  none  but  God  himself.” 

“And  what  then  ?  ”  said  Hypatia,  fixing  those  glorious  eyes  full  on 
his  face,  in  an  agony  of  doubt,  but  yet,  as  Raphael  declared  to  his 
dying  day,  of  hope  and  joy. 

“  Well,  Hypatia,  and  must  not  a  son  be  of  the  same  species  as  his 
father?”  ‘  Eagles,’  says  the  poet,  ‘  do  not  beget  doves.’  Is  the  word 
son  anything  but  an  empty  and  false  metaphor,  unless  the  son  be  the 
perfect  and  equal  likeness  of  his  father?” 

“  Heroes  beget  sons  worse  than  themselves,  says  the  poet.” 

“We  are  not  talking  now  of  men  as  they  are,  whom  Homer’s  Zeus 
calls  the  most  wretched  of  all  the  beasts  of  the  field  ;  we  are  talking 
— are  we  not? — of  a  perfect  and  archetypal  son,  and  a  perfect  and 
archetypal  father,  in  a  perfect  and  eternal  world,  wherein  is  neither 
growth,  decay,  nor  change  ;  and  of  a  perfect  and  archetypal  genera¬ 
tion,  of  which  the  only  definition  can  be,  that  like  begets  its  perfect 

like?.  . .  .You  are  silent.  Be  so,  Hypatia . We  have  gone  up  too 

far  into  the  abysses.” _ 


mE  PRODIGAES  RBTVRK. 


8^1 


And  so  they  both  were  silent  for  a  while.  An  d  Raphael  thought 
solemn  thoughts  about  Victoria,  and  about  ancient  signs  of  Isaiah’s 
which  were  to  him  none  the  less  prophecies  concerning  The  Man 
whom  he  had  found,  because  he  prayed  and  trusted  that  the  same 
signs  might  be  repeated  to  himself,  and  a  child  given  to  him  also,  as 
a  token  that,  in  spite  of  all  his  baseness,  “  God  was  with  him.” 

But  he  was  a  Jew,  and  a  man  :  Hypatia  was  a  Greek,  and  a  woman, 
— and  for  that  matter,  so  were  the  men  of  her  school.  To  her,  the 
relations  and  duties  of  common  humanity  shone  with  none  of  the 
awful  and  divine  meaning  which  they  did  in  the  eyes  of  the  con¬ 
verted  Jew,  awakened  for  the  first  time  in  his  life  to  know  the  mean¬ 
ing  of  his  own  Scriptures,  and  become  an  Israelite  indeed.  And  Ra¬ 
phael’s  dialectic,  too,  though  it  might  silence  her,  could  not  convince 
her.  Her  creed,  like  those  of  her  fellow-philosophers,  was  one  of 
the  fancy  and  the  religious  seniiment,  rather  than  of  the  reason  and 
the  moral  sense.  All  the  brilliant  cloud-world  in  which  she  had 
reveled  for  years, — cosmogonies,  emanations,  affinities,  symbolisms, 
hierarchies,  abysses,  eternities,  and  the  rest  of  it, — though  she  could 
not  rest  in  them,  not  even  believe  in  them, — though  they  had  vanished 
into  thin  air  at  her  most  utter  need,  yet — they  were  too  pretty  to  be 
lost  sight  of  forever  ;  and,  struggling  against  the  growing  conviction 
of  her  reason,  she  answered  at  last,' — 

“  And  you  would  have  me  give  up,  as  you  seem  to  have  done,  the 
sublime,  the  beautiful,  the  heavenly,  for  a  dry  and  barren  chain  of 
dialectic,  in  which,  for  aught  I  know — for  after  all,  Raphael,  I  can¬ 
not  cope  with  you, — I  am  a  woman, — a  weak  woman  !” 

And  she  covered  her  face  with  her  hands. 

“  For  aught  you  know,  what?”  asked  Raphael,  gently. 

“  You  may  have  made  the  wmrse  appear  the  better  reason.” 

“  So  said  Aristophanes  of  Socrates.  But  hear  me  once  more,  be¬ 
loved  Hypatia.  You  refuse  to  give  up  the  beautiful,  the  sublime, 
the  heavenly  ?  What  if  Raphael  Aben  Ezra,  at  least,  had  never 
found  them  till  now  ?  Recollect  what  I  said  just  now, — what  if  our 
old  beautiful,  and  sublime,  and  heavenly,  had  been  the  sheerest  ma¬ 
terialism,  notions  spun  by  our  own  brains  out  of  the  impressions  of 
pleasant  things,  and  high  things,  and  low  things,  and  awful  things, 
which  we  had  seen  with  our  bodily  eyes?  What  if  I  had  discovered 
that  the  spiritual  is  not  the  intellectual,  but  the  moral ;  and  that  the 
spiritual  world  is  not,  as  we  used  to  make  it,  a  world  of  our  own  in¬ 
tellectual  abstractions,  or  of  our  own  physical  emotions,  religious  or 
other,  but  a  world  of  righteous  or  unrighteous  persons?  What  if  I 
had  discovered  that  one  law  of  the  spiritual  world,  in  which  all  others 
were  concained,  was  righteousness  ;  and  that  disharmony  with  that 
law,  which  we  called  unspirituality,  was  not  being  vulgar,  or  clumsy, 
or  ill-taught,  or  unimaginative,  or  dull,  but  simply  being  unright¬ 
eous  ?  What  if  I  had  discovered  that  righteousness,  and  it  alone, 
was  the  beautiful,  righteousness  the  sublime,  the  heavenly,  the  God 
HYPATIA — 11 


BTPATIA 


like, — ay,  God  liimself  ?  And  wliat  if  it  liad  dawned  on  me,  as  by  a 
great  sunrise,  wbat  tliat  righteousness  was  like  ?  What  if  I  had  seen 
a  human  being,  a  woman  too,  a  young,  weak  girl,  showing  forth  the 
glory  and  the  beauty  of  God  ?  showing  me  that  the  beautiful  was  to 
mingle  unshrinking,  for  duty’s  sake,  with  all  that  is  most  foul  and 
loathsome  ;  that  the  sublime  was  to  stoop  to  the  most  menial  offices, 
the  most  outwardly  degrading  self-denials  ;  that  to  be  heavenly  was 
to  know  that  the  commonest  relations,  the  most  vulgar  duties  of 
earth,  were  God’s  commands,  and  only  to  be  performed  aright  by  the 
help  of  the  same  spirit  by  which  He  rules  the  universe  ;  that  right¬ 
eousness  was  to  love,  to  help,  to  sufEer  for — if  need  be,  to  die  for — 
those  who,  in  themselves,  seem  fitted  to  arouse  no  feelings  except  in¬ 
dignation  and  disgust  ?  What  if,  for  the  first  time,  I  trust  not  for 
the  last  time,  in  my  life,  I  saw  this  vision  ;  and  at  the  sight  of  it  my 
eyes  were  opened,  and  I  knew  it  for  the  likeness  and  the  glory  of 
God  ?  What  if  I,  a  Platonist,  like  John  of  Galilee,  and  Paul  of  Tar¬ 
sus,  yet,  like  them,  a  Hebrew  of  the  Hebrews,  had  confessed  to  my- 
selr, — If  the  creature  can  love  thus,  how  much  more  its  archetype? 
If  weak  woman  can  endure  thus,  how  much  more  a  Son  of  God  ?  If 
for  the  good  of  others  man  has  strength  to  sacrifice  himself  in  part, 
God  will  have  strength  to  sacrifice  himself  utterly.  If  He  has  not 
done  it.  He  will  do  it ;  or  He  will  be  less  beautiful,  less  sublime,  less 
heavenly,  less  righteous,  than  my  poor  conception  of  Him,  ay,  than 
this  weak,  playful  girl  I  Why  should  I  not  believe  those  who  tell 
me  that  He  has  done  it  already  ?  What  if  their  evidence  be,  after 
all,  only  probability?  I  do  not  want  mathematical  demonstration  to 
prove  to  me  that  when  a  child  was  in  danger  his  father  saved  him, — 
neither  do  I  here.  My  reason,  my  heart,  every  faculty  of  me,  ex¬ 
cept  this  stupid  sensuous  experience,  which  I  find  deceiving  me  every 
moment,  which  cannot  even  prove  to  me  my  own  existence,  accepts 
that  story  of  Calvary  as  the  most  natural,  most  probable,  most  nec¬ 
essary  of  earthly  events,  assuming  only  that  God  is  a  righteous  per¬ 
son,  and  not  some  dream  of  an  all-pervading  necessary  spirit, — non¬ 
sense  which,  in  its  very  terms,  confesses  its  own  materialism.” 

Hypatia  answered  with  a  forced  smile. 

“Kaphael  Aben-Ezrahas  deserted  the  method  of  the  severe  dialec¬ 
tician  for  that  of  the  eloquent  lover.” 

“  Not  altogether,”  said  he,  smiling  in  return.  “  For  suppose  that 
I  had  said  to  myself,  We  Platonists  agree  that  the  sight  of  God  is  the 
highest  good.” 

Hypatia  once  more  shuddered  at  last  night’s  recollections. 

“And  if  He  be  righteous,  and  righteousness  be — as  I  know  it  to  be 
— identical  with  love,  then  He  will  desire  that  highest  good  for  men 
far  more  than  they  can  desire  it  for  themselves . Then  He  will  de¬ 
sire  to  show  Himself  and  His  own  righteousness  to  them . Will 

you  make  answer,  dearest  Hypatia,  or  shall  I  ?.  . .  .or  does  your  silence 
give  consent  ?  At  least  let  me  go  on  to  say  this,  that  if  God  do  desire 


THS:  PRODIQAVS  RETURN. 


to  show  His  righteousness  to  men,  His  only  perfect  method,  accord¬ 
ing  to  Plato,  will  be  that  of  calumny,  persecution,  the  scourge,  and 
the  cross,  that  so  He,  like  Glaucon’s  righteous  man,  may  remain  for¬ 
ever  free  from  any  suspicion  of  selfish  interest,  or  weakness  of  endur¬ 
ance . Am  I  deserting  the  dialectic  method  now,  Hypatia?.  .  .  .You 

are  still  silent.  You  will  not  hear  me,  I  see . At  some  future  day, 

the  philosopher  may  condescend  to  lend  a  kinder  ear  to  the  words  of 

her  greatest  debtor . Or,  rather,  she  may  condescend  to  hear,  in 

her  own  heart,  the  voice  of  that  Archetypal  Man,  who  has  been  lov¬ 
ing  her,  guiding  her,  heaping  her  with  every  perfection  of  body  and 
of  mind,  inspiring  her  with  all  pure  and  noble  longings,  and  only 
asks  of  her  to  listen  to  her  own  reason,  her  own  philosophy,  when 
they  proclaim  Him  as  the  giver  of  them,  and  to  impart  them  freely 
and  humbly,  as  He  has  imparted  them  to  her,  to  the  poor,  and  the 

brutish,  and  the  sinful,  whom  He  loves  as  well  as  He  loves  her . 

Farewell  !  ” 

“  Stay  !  ”  said  she,  springing  up  ;  whither  are  you  going  ?  ” 

“  To  do  a  little  good  before  I  die,  having  done  much  evil.  To  farm, 
plant,  and  build,  and  rescue  a  little  corner  of  Ormuzd’s  earth,  as  the 
Persians  would  say,  out  of  the  dominion  of  Ahriman.  To  fight 
Ausurian  robbers,  feed  Thracian  mercenaries,  save  a  few  widows 

from  starvation  and  a  few  orphans  from  slavery . Perhaps  to  leave 

behind  me  a  son  of  David’s  line,  who  will  be  a  better  Jew,  because  a 

better  Christian,  than  his  father . We  shall  have  trouble  in  the 

flesh,  Augustine  tells  us . But,  as  I  answered  him,  I  really  have 

had  so  little  thereof  yet,  that  my  fair  share  may  probably  be  rather  a 
useful  education  than  otherwise.  Farewell  !  ” 

“Stay!”  said  she.  “Come  again! — again!  And  her.  ..  .Bring 

her . I  must  see  her  !  She  must  be  noble  indeed,  to  be  worthy  of 

you.” 

“  She  is  many  a  hundred  miles  away.” 

“Ah?  Perhaps  she  might  have  taught  something  to  me, — me,  the 

philosopher  !  You  need  not  have  feared  me . I  have  no  heart  to 

make  converts  now . O  Raphael  Aben-Ezra,  why  break  the  bruised 

reed?  My  plans  are  scattered  to  the  winds,  my  pupils  worthless, 
my  fair  name  tarnished,  my  conscience  heavy  with  the  thought  of 

my  own  cruelty . If  you  do  not  know  all,  you  will  know  it  but 

too  soon . My  last  hope,  Synesius,  implores  for  himself  the  hope 

<vhich  I  need  from  him . And,  over  and  above  it  all . You  !.  . .  . 

Et  tu.  Brute  !  Why  not  fold  my  mantle  round  me,  like  Julius  oi 
old,  and  die  !  ” 

Raphael  stood  looking  sadly  at  her,  as  her  whole  face  sunk  into 
utter  prostration. 

******** 

“  Yes,  come . The  Galila3an . If  he  conquers  strong  men,  can 

the  weak  maid  resist  him?  Come  soon . This  afternoon . My 

heart  is  breaking  fast,” 

o 


824 


IITPATIA. 


‘‘At  tlie  eiglitli  liour  tliis  afternoon 

“Yes . At  noon  I  lecture . Take  my  farewell,  ratlier,  for¬ 
ever  of  tlie  schools . Gods  !  What  have  I  to  say  ?. . .  .And  tell  me 

about  him  of  Nazareth.  Farewell  1  ” 

“  Farewell,  beloved  lady  !  At  the  ninth  hour  you  shall  hear  of  him 
of  Nazareth.” 

Why  did  his  own  words  sound  to  him  strangely  pregnant,  all  but 
ominous  ?  He  almost  fancied  that  not  he,  but  some  third  person, 
had  spoken  them,  lie  kissed  Hypatia’s  hand.  It  was  as  cold  as  ice  ; 
and  his  heart,  too,  in  spite  of  all  his  bliss,  felt  cold  and  heavy,  as  he 
left  the  room. 

As  he  Avent  down  the  steps  into  the  street,  a  young  man  sprung 
from  behind  one  of  the  pillars,  and  seized  his  arm. 

“  Aha  !  my  young  Coryphaeus  of  pious  plunderers  !  What  do  you 
Avant  Avith  me  ?  ” 

Philammon,  for  it  Avas  he,  looked  at  him  an  instant,  and  recognized 
him. 

“Save  her  I  for  the  loAm  of  God  save  her  I  ” 

“  Whom  ?  ” 

“  Hypatia  !  ” 

“  Hoav  long  has  her  saH^ation  been  important  to  you,  my  good 
friend  ?  ” 

“For  God’s  sake,”  said  Philammon,  “go  back  and  warn  her! 
She  AA’ill  hear  you, — you  are  rich, — you  used  to  bo  her  friend, — I 

knoAV  you,  I  have  heard  of  you . O,  if  you  ever  cared  for  her, — 

if  you  OA'er  felt  a  thousandth  part  of  Avhat  I  feel, — go  in  and  warn 
her  not  to  stir  from  home  1  ” 

“  I  must  hear  more  of  this,”  said  Raphael,  avIio  saw  that  the  boy 
AA^as  in  earnest.  “  Come  in  Avith  me  and  speak  to  her  father.” 

“  No  !  not  into  that  house  !  Never  into  that  house  again  !  Do 
not  ask  me  wh}’-  :  but  go  yourself.  She  Avill  not  hear  me.  Did  you 
— did  you  prevent  her  from  listening?” 

“  What  do  you  mean?  ” 

“  I  have  been  heia^ — ages  !  I  sent  a  note  in  by  her  maid,  and  she 
returned  no  ansAver.” 

Raphael  recollected  then,  for  the  first  time,  a  note  Avhich  he  had 
seen  brought  to  her  during  the  conversation. 

“I  saAv  her  receiA^e  a  note.  Slie  tossed  it  away.  Tell  me  your 
stoiw.  If  there  is  reason  in  it,  I  Avill  bear  your  message  myself.  Of 
what  is  she  to  be  Avarned  ?  ” 

“  Of  a  ])lot — I  knoAv  that  there  is  a  plot — against  her  among  the 
monks  and  parabolani.  As  I  lay  in  bed  this  morning  in  Arsenius’s 
room, — they  thought  I  Avas  asleep - ” 

“Arsenins  ?  Has  that  venerable  fanatic,  then,  gone  the  Avay  of  all 
monastic  flesh,  and  turned  persecutor  ?  ” 

“  God  forbid  ?  I  heard  liim  beseeching  Peter  the  Reader  to  refrain 
from  something,  I  cannot  tell  Avhat ;  but  I  caught  her  name . I 


THE  PRODIGAHS  RETURH 


325 

heard  Peter  say,  ‘  She  that  hindereth  will  hinder  till  she  be  taken 
out  of  the  way.’  And  when  he  went  out  into  the  passage  I  heard 
him  say  to  another,  ‘  That  thou  doest,  do  quickly  !  ’  ” 

“These  are  slender  grounds,  my  friend.” 

“  Ah,  you  do  not  know  of  what  those  men  are  capable  !  ” 

“Do  I  not ?  Where  did  you  and  I  meet  last ? ” 

Philammon  blushed,  and  burst  forth  again.  “  That  was  enough 
for  me.  I  know  the  hatred  which  they  bear  her,  the  crimes  which 
they  attribute  to  her.  Her  house  would  have  been  attacked  last  night 

had  it  not  been  for  Cyril . And  I  knew  Peter’s  tone.  He  spoke 

too  gently  and  softly  not  to  mean  something  devilish.  I  watched  all 
the  morning  for  an  opportunity  of  escape,  and  here  I  am  !  Will  you 
take  my  message,  or  see  her - ” 

‘  ‘  What  ?  ” 

“  God  only  knows,  and  the  Devil  whom  they  worship  instead  of 
God.” 

Raphael  hurried  back  into  the  house, — “  Could  he  see  Hypatia?  ” 
She  had  shut  herself  up  in  her  private  room,  strictly  commanding 

that  no  visitor  should  be  admitted . “  Where  was  Theon,  then?  ” 

He  had  gone  out  by  the  canal  gate  half  an  hour  before,  with  a  bun- 

.dle  of  mathematical  papers  under  his  arm,  no  one  knew  whither . 

“  Imbecile  old  idiot  !  ”  and  he  hastily  wrote  on  his  tablet, — 

“  Do  not  despise  the  young  monk’s  warning.  I  believe  him  to 
speak  the  truth.  As  you  love  yourself  and  your  father,  Hypatia,  stir 
not  out  to-day.” 

He  bribed  a  maid  to  take  the  message  up- stairs  ;  and  passed  his 
time  in  the  hall  in  warning  the  servants.  But  they  would  not  be¬ 
lieve  him.  It  was  true  the  shops  were  shut  in  some  quarters,  and 
the  Museum  gardens  empty  ;  people  were  a  little  frightened  after 
yesterday.  But  Cyril,  they  had  heard  for  certain,  had  threatened 
excommunication  only  last  night  to  any  Christian  who  broke  the 
peace  ;  and  there  had  not  been  a  monk  to  be  seen  in  the  streets  the 
whole  morning.  And  as  for  any  harm  happening  to  their  mistress, 
— impossible  !  “  The  very  wild  beasts  would  not  tear  her,”  said  the 

huge  negro  porter,  “if  she  were  thrown  into  the  amphitheater.” 

Whereat  a  maid  boxed  his  ears  for  talking  of  such  a  thing  ;  and 
then,  by  way  of  mending  it,  declared  that  she  knew  for  certain  that 
her  mistress  could  turn  aside  the  lightning,  and  call  legions  of  spirits 
to  fight  for  her  with  a  nod . What  was  to  be  done  with  such  idola¬ 

ters?  And  yet  who  could  help  liking  them  the  better  for  it? 

At  last  the  answer  came  down,  in  the  old,  graceful,  studied,  self- 
conscious  handwriting. 

“  It  is  a  strange  way  of  persuading  me  to  your  new  faith,  to  bid 
me  beware,  on  the  very  first  day  of  your  preaching,  of  the  wickedness 
of  those  who  believe  it.  I  thank  you  ;  but  your  affection  for  me 
makes  you  timorous.  I  dread  nothing.  They  will  not  dare.  Did 
they  dare  now,  they  would  have  dared  long  ago.  As  for  that  youth, 


BTPATIA 


3^6 

— to  obey  or  to  believe  liis  word,  even  to  seem  aware  of  bis  existence, 
were  shame  to  me  henceforth.  Because  he  is  insolent  enough  to  W'arn 
me,  therefore  I  will  go.  Fear  not  for  me.  You  would  not  wish  me, 
for  the  first  time  in  my  life;  to  fear  for  myself.  I  must  follow  my 
destiny.  I  must  speak  the  words  which  I  have  to  speak.  Above  all, 
I  must  let  no  Christian  say,  that  the  philosopher  dared  less  than  the 
fanatic.  If  my  Gods  are  Gods,  then  will  they  protect  me  ;  and  if 
not,  let  your  God  prove  his  rule  as  seems  to  him  good.” 

Raphael  tore  the  letter  to  fragments . The  guards,  at  least,  were 

not  gone  mad  like  the  rest  of  the  world.  It  wanted  half  an  hour  of 
the  time  of  her  lecture.  In  the  interval  he  might  summon  force 
enough  to  crush  all  Alexandria.  And  turning  suddenly,  he  darted 
out  of  the  room  and  out  of  the  house. 

“  Quern  Deus  vult  perdere  !  ”  cried  he  to  Philammon,  with  a  gesture 
of  grief.  ‘  ‘  Stay  here  and  stop  her  ! — make  a  last  appeal  !  Drag  the 
horses’  heads  down,  if  you  can!  I  will  be  back  in  ten  minutes.  ” 
And  he  ran  off  for  the  nearest  gate  of  the  Museum  gardens. 

On  the  other  side  of  the  gardens  lay  the  court-yard  of  the  palace. 
There  were  gates  in  plenty  communicating  between  them.  If  he 
could  but  see  Orestes,  even  alarm  the  guard  in  time  I . 

And  he  hurried  through  the  walks  and  alcoves,  now  deserted  by 
the  fearful  citizens,  to  the  nearest  gate.  It  was  fast,  and  barricaded 
firmly  on  the  outside. 

Terrified,  he  ran  on  to  the  next  ;  it  was  barred  also.  He  saw  the 
reason  in  a  moment,  and  maddened  as  he  saw  it.  The  guards,  care¬ 
less  about  the  Museum,  or  reasonably  fearing  no  danger  from  the 
Alexandrian  populace  to  the  glory  and  wonder  of  their  city,  or  per¬ 
haps  wishing  wisely  enough  to  concentrate  their  forces  in  the  nar¬ 
rowest  space,  had  contented  tliemselves  with  cutting  off  all  communi¬ 
cation  with  the  gardens,  and  so  converting  the  lofty  partition- wall 
into  the  outer  enceinte  of  their  marble  citadel.  At  all  events,  the 
doors  leading  from  the  Museum  itself  might  be  open.  He  knew  them 
every  one,  every  hall,  passage,  statue,  picture,  almost  every  book,  in 
that  vast  treasure-house  of  ancient  civilization.  He  found  an  en¬ 
trance,  hurried  through  well-known  corridors  to  a  postern  through 
which  he  and  Orestes  had  lounged  a  hundred  times,  their  lips  full  of 
bad  words,  their  hearts  of  worse  thoughts,  gathered  in  those  records 

of  the  fair  wickedness  of  old . If  was  fast.  He  beat  upon  it ;  but 

no  one  answered.  He  rushed  on  and  tried  another.  No  one  answered 
there.  Another,  still  silence  and  despair  ! . He  rushed  up-stairs,  hop¬ 

ing  that  from  the  windows  above  he  might  be  able  to  call  to  the  guard. 
The  prudent  soldiers  had  locked  and  barricaded  the  entrances  to  the 
upper  floors  of  the  whole  right  wing,  lest  the  palace  court  should  be 
commanded  from  thence.  Whither  now  ?  Back, — and  whither  then  ? 
Back,  round  endless  galleries,  vaulted  halls,  staircases,  doorways, 
some  fast,  some  open,  up  and  down,  trying  this  way  and  that,  losing 
himself  at  whiles  in  that  enormous,  sib  nt  labyrinth.  And  his  breath 


PnoDlGATJ8  RETURN. 


failed  Mm,  his  throat  parched,  his  face  burned  as  with  the  simoon 
wind,  his  legs  were  trembling  under  him.  His  presence  of  mind, 
usually  so  perfect,  failed  him  utterly.  He  was  baffled,  netted  ;  there 
was  a  spell  upon  him.  Was  it  a  dream?  Was  it  all  one  of  those 
hideous  nightmares  of  endless  pillars  beyond  pillars,  stairs  above 
stairs,  rooms  within  rooms,  changing,  shifting,  lengthening  out 
forever  and  forever  before  the  dreamer,  narrowing,  closing  in  on 
him,  choking  him?  Was  it  a  dream?  Was  he  doomed  to  wander 
forever  and  forever  in  some  palace  of  the  dead,  to  expiate  the  sin 
which  he  had  learned  and  done  therein  ?  His  brain,  for  the  first  time 
in  his  life,  began  to  reel.  He  could  recollect  nothing  but  that 
something  dreadful  was  to  happen, — and  that  lie  had  to  prevent  it, 

and  could  not . Where  was  he  now?  In  a  little  by-chamber . 

He  had  talked  with  her  there  a  hundred  times,  looking  out  over  the 

Pharos  and  the  bine  Mediterranean . What  was  that  roar  below  ? 

...  .A  sea  of  weltering,  yelling  heads,  thousands  on  thousands,  down 
to  the  very  beach  ;  and  from  their  innumerable  throats  one  mighty 
war-cry, — “God,  and  the  mother  of  God!”  Cyril’s  hounds  were 

loose . He  reeled  from  the  window,  and  darted  frantically  away 

again. . .  .whither,  he  knew  not,  and  never  knew  until  his  dying  day. 

And  Philammon  ?. . .  .Sufficient  for  the  chapter,  as  for  the  day,  is 
the  evil  thereof. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII. 


woman’s  love. 

Pelaota  had  passed  chat  night  alone  in  sleepless  sorrow,  which 
was  not  diminished  by  her  finding  herself  the  next  morning  palpably 
a.prisoner  in  her  own  house.  Her  girls  told  her  that  they  had  orders 
— they  would  not  say  from  whom — to  prevent  her  leaving  her  own 
apartments.  And,  though  some  of  them  made  the  announcement 
with  sighs  and  tears  of  condolence,  yet  more  than  one,  she  could  see, 
was  well  inclined  to  make  her  feel  that  her  power  was  over,  and  that 
there  were  others  besides  herself  who  might  aspire  to  the  honor  of 
reigning  favorite 

What  matter  to  her  Whispers,  sneers,  and  saucy  answers  fell  on 
her  eai  unheeded.  She  had  one  idol,  and  she  had  lost  it ;  one  power, 
and  it  had  failed  her.  In  the  heaven  above,  and  in  the  earth  be- 
^neatli,  was  neither  peace,  nor  help,  nor  hope;  nothing  but  black, 
blank,  stupid  terror  and  despair.  The  little  w^eak,  infant  soul,  which 
had  just  awakened  in  her,  had  been  crushed  and  stunned  in  its  very 
birth-hour  ;  and  instinctively  she  crept  away  to  the  roof  of  th<9  tower 
where  her  apartments  were,  to  sit  and  weep  alone. 

There  she  sat,  hour  after  hour,  beneath  the  shade  of  the  large 
wind-sail,  which  served  in  all  Alexandrian  houses  the  double  purpose 
of  a  shelter  from  the  sun  and  a  ventilator  for  the  rooms  below  ;  and 
her  eye  roved  carelessly  over  that  endless  sea  of  roofs,  and  towers, 
and  masts,  and  glittering  canals,  and  gliding  boats  :  but  she  saw 
none  of  them, — nothing  but  one  beloved  face,  lost,  lost  forever. 

At  last  a  low  whistle  roused  her  from  her  dream.  She  looked  up. 
Across  the  narrow  lane,  from  one  of  the  embrasures  of  the  opposite 
house-parapet,  bright  eyes  were  peering  at  her.  She  moved  angrily 
to  escape  them. 

The  whistle  was  repeated,  and  a  head  rose  cautiously  above  the 
parapet . It  was  Miriam’s.  Casting  a  careful  look  around,  Pela¬ 

gia  went  forward.  What  could  the  old  woman  want  with  her  ? 

Miriam  made  interrogative  signs,  which  Pelagia  understood  as 
asking  her  whether  she  was  alone  ;  and  the  moment  that  an  answ^er 
in  the  negative  was  returned,  Miriam  rose,  tossed  over  to  her  fef^  a 
letter  weighted  with  a  pebble,  and  then  vanished  again. 

“  I  have  watched  here  all  day.  They  refused  me  admittance  be¬ 
low.  Beware  of  Wulf,  of  every  one.  Do  not  stir  from  your  cham¬ 
ber.  There  is  a  plot  to  carry  you  off  to-night,  and  give  you  up  to 
your  brother  the  monk  ;  you  are  betrayed  ;  be  brave  !  ” 

(  328  ) 


WOMAN^S  LOVE. 


329 


Pelagia  read  it  with  blancliing  clieek  and  staring  eyes  ;  and  took 
at  least  the  last  part  of  Miriam’s  advice.  For,  walking  down  the  stair, 
she  passed  proudly  through  her  own  rooms,  and,  commanding  back 
the  girls  who  would  have  stayed  her  with  a  voice  and  gesture  at 
which  they  quailed,  went  straight  down,  the  letter  in  her  hand,  to 
the  apartment  where  the  Amal  usually  spent  his  midday  hours. 

As  she  approached  the  door,  she  heard  loud  voices  within . His  ! 

— yes;  but  Wulf’s  also.  Her  heart  failed  her,  and  she  stopped  a 

moment  to  listen . She  heard  Hypatia’s  name  ;  and,  mad  with 

curiosity,  crouched  down  at  the  lock,  and  hearkened  to  every  word. 

“  She  will  not  accept  me,  Wulf.” 

“  If  she  will  not,  she  shall  go  farther  and  fare  worse.  Besides,  I 
tell  you,  she  is  hard  run.  It  is  her  last  chance,  and  she  will  jump  a.t 
it.  The  Christians  are  mad  with  her  ;  if  a  storm  blows  up,  her  life 
is  not  worth — that  !  ” 

“  It  is  pity  that  we  have  not  brought  her  hither  already.” 

“  It  is  ;  but  we  could  not.  We  must  not  break  with  Orestes  till  the 
palace  is  in  our  hands.” 

“  And  will  it  ever  be  in  our  hands,  my  friend  ?” 

“Certain.  We  were  round  at  every  picket  last  night,  and  the 
very  notion  of  an  Amal’s  heading  them  made  them  so  eager  that  we 
had  to  bribe  them  to  be  quiet  rather  than  to  rise.” 

‘  ‘  Odin  !  I  wish  I  were  among  them  now  !  ” 

“  Wait  till  the  city  rises.  If  the  day  pass  over  without  a  riot,  I 
know  nothing.  The  treasure  is  all  on  board,  is  it  not?” 

“  Yes,  and  the  galleys  ready.  I  have  been  working  like  a  horse 
at  them  all  the  morning,  as  you  would  let  us  do  nothing  else.  And 
Goderic  will  not  be  back  from  the  palace,  you  say,  till  nightfall  ?  ” 

“  If  we  are  attacked  first,  we  are  to  throw  up  a  fire-signal  to  him, 
and  he  is  to  come  off  hither  with  what  Goths  he  can  muster.  If  the 
palace  is  attacked  first,  he  is  to  give  us  the  signal,  and  we  are  to 
pack  up  and  row  round  thither.  And  in  the  meanwhile,  he  is  to 
make  that  hound  of  a  Greek  prefect  as  drunk  as  he  can.  ” 

“  The  Greek  will  see  him  under  the  table  !  He  has  drugs,  I 
know,  as  all  these  Roman  rascals  have  to  sober  him  when  he 
likes  ;  and  then  he  sets  to  work  and  drinks  again.  Send  off  old  Smid, 
and  let  him  beat  the  armorer  if  he  can!” 

“Avery  good  thought  !”  said  Wulf,  and  came  out  instantly  for 
the  purpose  of  putting  it  in  practice. 

Pelagia  had  just  time  to  retreat  into  an  adjoining  doorway  ;  but 
she  had  heard  enough  ;  and  as  Wulf  passed,  she  sprung  to  him  and 
caught  him  by  the  arm. 

“  O,  come  in  hither!  Speak  to  me  one  moment;  for  mercy’s 
sake  speak  to  me  !  ”  and  she  drew  him,  half  against  his  Avill,  into 
the  chamber,  and  throwing  herself  at  his  feet,  broke  out  into  a  child¬ 
like  wail. 

Wulf  stood  silent,  utterly  discomfited  by  this  unexpected  sub 


830 


HYPATIA, 


mission,  where  he  had  expected  petulant  and  artful  resistance. 
He  almost  felt  guilty  and  ashamed,  as  he  looked  down  into  that 
beautiful,  imploring  face,  convulsed  with  simple  sorrow,  as  of  a 
child  for  a  broken  toy . At  last  she  spoke. 

“  O,  what  have  I  done  ? — what  have  I  done  1  Why  must  you  take 
him  from  me?  What  have  I  done  but  love  him,  honor  him,  worship 
him  ?  I  know  you  love  him  ;  and  I  love  you  for  it, — I  do  indeed  ! 
But  you, — what  is  your  love  to  mine  ?  O,  I  would  die  for  him,  be 
torn  in  pieces  for  him — now,  this  moment  !  ” 

Wulf  was  silent. 

“What  have  I  done  but  love  him?  -  What  could  I  wish  but  to 
make  him  happy?  I  was  rich  enough,  praised  and  petted  ;  . .  .and 
then  he  came,. . .  .glorious  as  he  is,  like  a  god  among  men, — among 
apes  rather, — and  I  worshiped  him  :  was  I  wrong  in  that?  I  gave 
up  all  for  him  :  was  I  wrong  in  that  ?  I  gave  him  myself  ;  what 
could  I  do  more  !  He  condescended  to  like  me, — he,  the  hero  !  Could 
I  help  submitting?  I  loved  him:  could  I  help  loving  him?  Did  I 
wrong  him  in  that  ?  Cruel,  cruel  Wulf  !”.... 

Wulf  was  forced  to  be  stern,  or  he  would  have  melted  at  once. 

“  And  what  was  your  love  worth  to  him?  What  has  it  done  for 
him  ?  It  has  made  him  a  sot,  an  idler,  a  laughing-stock  to  these 
Greek  dogs,  when  he  might  have  been  their  conqueror,  their  king. 
Foolish  woman,  who  cannot  see  that  your  love  has  been  his  bane,  his 
ruin  !  He,  who  ought  by  now  to  have  been  sitting  upon  the  throne  of 
the  Ptolemies,  the  lord  of  all  south  of  the  Mediterranean, — as  he 
shall  be  still  !  ” 

Pelagia  looked  at  him  wide-eyed,  as  if  her  mind  was  taking  in 
slowly  some  vast  new  thought,  under  the  weight  of  which  it  reeled 
already.  Then  she  rose  slowly. 

“  And  he  might  be  Emperor  of  Africa?  '* 

“  And  he  shall  be  ;  but  not - ” 

“  Not  with  me  !  ”  she  almost  shrieked.  “  No  !  not  with  wretched, 
ignorant,  polluted  me  !  1  see — 0  God,  I  see  it  all !  And  this  is  why 

you  want  him  to  marry  her, — her - ” 

She  could  not  utter  the  dreaded  name. 

Wulf  could  not  trust  himself  to  speak  ;  but  he  bowed  his  head  in 
acquiescence. 

*%*****-3£- 

“Yes, — I  will  go — up  into  the  desert — with  Philammon, — and  you 
shall  never  hear  of  me  again.  And  I  will  be  a  nun,  and  pray  for 
him,  that  he  may  be  a  great  king,  and  conquer  all  the  world.  You 
will  tell  him  why  I  went  away,  will  you  not?  Yes,  I  will  go, — now, 
at  once - ” 

She  turned  hurriedly,  as  if  to  act  upon  her  promise,  and  then  she 
si)rung  again  to  Wulf  with  a  sudden  shudder. 

“1  cannot,  Wulf, — I  cannot  leave  him!  I  shall  go  mad  if  I 
do  1  Do  not  be  angry  ; — I  will  promise  anything,  take  any  oath 


WOMAN^S  LOVE. 


831 


you  like,  if  you  will  only  let  me  stay  here.  Only  as  a  slave, — as  any¬ 
thing-, — if  I  may  but  look  at  him  sometimes.  No, — not  even  that, — ■ 
but  to  be  under  the  same  roof  with  him,  only  !  O,  let  me  be  but  a 
slave  in  the  kitchen  !  I  will  make  over  all  I  have  to  him, — to  you, — 
to  any  one  !  And  you  shall  tell  him  that  I  am  gone,  dead,  if  you  will. 

Only  let  me  stay  !  And  I  will  wear  rags,  and  grind  in  the  mill . 

Even  that  will  be  delicious,  to  know  that  he  is  eating  the  bread  which 
I  have  made  !  And  if  I  ever  dare  speak  to  him, — even  to  come  near 
him, — let  the  steward  hang  me  up  by  the  wrists,  and  whip  me,  like 
the  slave  which  I  deserve  to  be  !.  .  .  .And  then  shall  I  soon  grow  old 
and  ugly  with  grief,  and  there  will  be  no  more  danger  then,  dear 
Wulf,  will  there,  from  this  accursed  face  of  mine?  Only  promise 

me  that,  and -  There  !  he  is  calling  you  !  Don’t  let  him  come  in 

and  see  me  ! — I  cannot  bear  it  !  Goto  him,  quick,  and  tell  him  all. — 
No,  don’t  tell  him  yet.”.  .  .  . 

And  she  sunk  down  again  on  the  floor,  as  Wulf  went  out,  murmur¬ 
ing  to  himself, — 

“Poor  child  !  poor  child  !  well  for  thee  this  day  if  thou  wert  dead, 
and  at  the  bottom  of  Hela  !  ” 

And  Pelagia  heard  what  he  said. 

Gradually,  amid  sobs  and  tears,  and  stormy  confusion  of  impossible 
hopes  and  projects,  those  words  took  root  in  her  mind,  and  spread, 
till  they  filled  her  whole  heart  and  brain. 

“Well  for  me  if  I  were  dead  ?  ” 

And  she  rose  slowly. 

“  Well  for  me  if  I  were  dead?  And  why  not  ?  Then  it  would  in¬ 
deed  be  all  settled.  There  would  be  no  more  danger  from  poor  little 
Pelagia  then.”.  . .  . 

She  went  slowly,  firmly,  proudly,  into  the  well-known  chamber. 
...  .She  threw  herself  upon  the  bed,  and  covered  the  pillow  with 
kisses.  Her  eye  fell  on  the  Amal’s  sword,  which  hung  across  the 
bed’s-head,  after  the  custom  of  Gothic  warriors.  She  seized  it,  and 
took  it  down,  shuddering. 

“  Yes  !. . .  .Let  it  be  with  this,  if  it  must  be.  And  it  must  be.  I 
cannot  bear  it  !  Anything  but  shame  !  To  have  fancied  all  my  life 
— vain  fool  that  I  was  ! — that  every  one  loved  and  admired  me,  and 
to  find  that  they  were  despising  me,  hating  me,  all  along  !  Those 
students  at  the  lecture- room  door  told  me  I  was  despised. — The  old 
monk  told  me  so. — Fool  that  I  was  !  I  forgot  it  next  day  ! — For  he — 
he  loved  me  still  ! — Ah,  how  could  I  believe  them,  till  his  own  lips  had 
said  it  ?. . .  .Intolerable  !.  . .  .And  yet  women  as  bad  as  I  am  have  been 
honored — when  they  were  dead.  What  was  that  song  which  I  used 
to  sing  about  Epicharis,  who  hung  herself  in  the  litter,  and  Leaina, 
who  bit  out  her  tongue,  lest  the  torture  should  drive  them  to  betray 
their  lovers  ?  There  used  to  be  a  statue  of  Leaina,  they  say,  at 

Athens, — a  lioness  without  a  tongue . And  whenever  I  sung  the 

song,  the  theater  used  to  rise,  and  shout,  and  call  them  noble  and 


332 


HYPATIA. 


blessed . I  never  could  tell  wliy  then  ;  but  I  know  now  ! — I  know 

now  !  Perhaps  they  may  call  me  noble,  after  all.  At  least,  they  may 
say,  ‘  She  was  a  —  a  —  but  she  dare  die  for  the  man  she  loved 
Ay,  but  God  despises  me  too,  and  hates  me.  He  will  send  me  to 
eternal  fire.  Philammon  said  so, — though  he  was  my  brother.  The 

old  monk  said  so, — though  he  wept  as  he  said  it . The  flames 

of  hell  forever  !  O,  not  forever  !  Great,  dreadful  God  !  not  for¬ 
ever  !  Indeed,  I  did  not  know  !  No  one  taught  me  about  right 
and  Avrong,  and  I  never  knew  that  I  had  been  baptized, — indeed, 
I  never  knew  !  And  it  Avas  so  pleasant, — so  pleasant  to  lae  happy, 
and  praised,  and  loA^ed,  and  to  see  happy  faces  round  me.  Hoav 
could  I  help  it  ?  The  birds  there  aa'Iio  are  singing  in  the  darling, 
beloved  court, — they  do  Avhat  they  like,  and  Thou  art  not  angry  Avith 
them  for  being  happy  ?  And  Thou  Avilt  not  be  more  cruel  tome  than 
to  them,  great  God,  —  for  AA'hat  did  I  know  more  than  they?  Thou 
Avho  hast  made  the  beautiful  sunshine,  and  the  pleasant,  pleasant 
Avorld,  and  the  flowers,  and  the  birds, — Thou  Avilt  not  send  me  to 
burn  for  ever  and  CAmr?  Will  not  a  hundred  years  be  punishment 
enough, — or  a  thousand?  O  God!  is  not  this  punishment  enough 
already, — to  have  to  leaA^e  him,  just  as — just  as  I  am  beginning  to 
long  to  be  good,  and  to  be  worthy  of  him?  ....  O,  have  mercy, — 
mercy, — mercy, — and  let  me  go  after  I  have  been  punished  enough  ! 
Why  may  I  not  turn  into  a  bird,  or  eA’en  a  Avorm,  and  come  back 
again  out  of  that  horrible  place,  to  see  the  sun  shine,  and  the  floAvers 
groAV  once  more?  0,  am  I  not  punishing  myself  already  ?  Will  not 
this  help  to  atone?  ....  Yes, — I  will  die  !  —  and  perhaps  so  God  may 
pity  me  !  ”  ' 

And  with  trembling  hands  she  dreAV  the  SAVord  from  its  sheath, 
and  covered  the  blade  Avith  kisses. 

“Yes, — on  this  SAAmrd, — Avith  Avhich  he  Avon  his  battles.  That  is 
right, — his  to  the  last  !  Hoav  keen  and  cold  it  looks  !  Will  it  be  very 
painful  ?  .  .  .  .  No, — I  Avill  not  try  the  point,  or  my  heart  might  fail 
me.  I  will  fall  on  it  at  once  :  let  it  hurt  me  as  it  may,  it  will  be  too 
late  to  draAV  back  then.  And  after  all  it  is  his  sword, — it  Avill  not 
have  the  heart  to  torture  me  much.  And  yet  he  struck  me  himself  this 
morning  !  ” 

And  at  that  thought,  a  long,  Avild  cry  of  misery  broke  from  her 
lips,  and  rung  through  the  house.  Hurriedly  she  fastened  the  SAAmrd 
upright  to  the  foot  of  the  bed,  and  tore  open  her  tunic  ....  “  Here, 
— under  this  AvidoAved  bosom,  AAdiere  his  head  Avill  ne\"er  lie  again  1 
There  are  footsteps  in  the  passage  1  Quick,  Pelagia  I  Noav - ” 

And  she  threAv  up  her  arms  Avildly,  in  act  to  fall. .... 

“  It  is  his  step  !  And  he  will  find  me,  and  never  knoAV  that  it  is 
for  him  I  die  1  ” 

The  Amal  tried  the  door.  It  Avas  fast.  With  a  single  blow  he 
burst  it  open,  and  demanded, — 

“What  was  that  shriek!  What  is  the  meaning  of  this?  Pel¬ 
agia  I  ” 


WOMAN’S  LOVE. 


333 


Pelagia,  like  a  cliild  caught  playing  with  a  forbidden  toy,  hid  her 
face  in  her  hands,  and  cowered  down. 

“  What  is  it?”  cried  he,  lifting  her. 

But  she  burst  from  his  arms. 

“  No,  no  ! — never  more  !  I  am  not  worthy  of  you  !  Let  me  die, 
wretch  that  I  am  !  I  can  only  drag  you  down.  You  must  be  a  king. 
You  must  marry  her, — the  wise  woman  !  ” 

“  Hypatia?  She  is  dead  !  ” 

“  Dead  ?  ”  shrieked  Pelagia. 

“Murdered,  an  hour  ago,  by  those  Christian  devils.” 

Pelagia  put  her  hands  over  her  eyes,  and  burst  into  tears  Were 
they  of  pity  or  of  joy?. . .  .She  did  not  ask  herself  ;  and  we  will  not 
ask  her. 

“  Where  is  my  sword  ?  Soul  of  Odin  !  why  is  it  fastened  here  ?  ” 

“I  was  going  to — Do  not  be  angry  !. . .  .They  told  me  that  I  had 
better  die,  and - ” 

The  Amal  stood  thunderstruck  for  a  moment. 

“  Oh,  do  not  strike  me  again  !  Send  me  to  the  mill.  Kill  me  now 
with  your  own  hand  !  Anything  but  another  blow  !  ” 

“A  blow? — Noble  woman!”  cried  the  Amal,  clasping  her  in  his 
arms. 

The  storm  was  past ;  and  Pelagia  had  been  nestling  to  that  beloved 
heart,  cooing  like  a  happy  dove,  for  many  a  minute  before  the  Amal 
aroused  himself  and  her . 

“  Now  ! — quick  !  We  have  not  a  moment  to  lose.  Up  to  the  tower, 
where  you  will  be  safe  ;  and  then  to  show  these  curs  what  comes  of 
snarling  round  the  wild  wolves’  den  !  ” 


CHAPTER  XXTX. 

5T3tfESIS. 

A^td  'W’fc.5  tlie  AtnaTs  news  trne,  then  ? 

PiiihtiLiri'^nj  saw  Raphael  rush  across  the  street  into  the  Musenm 
ri*ro^2>s.  His  last  words  iiad  been  a  command  to  stay  where  he  was  ; 
aiid  the  "ryjj  oh^j^d  him.  The  hlacrk  jKirter  who  let  Raphael  out  told 
Ir.rr.  somewhi^t  in^dently,  that  his  mistress  would  see  no  one,  and 
recfciic  tjo  messages  :  hut  he  had  made  up  lus  mind  ;  complained  of 
the  sui;.  quietly  ensconced  himself  behind  a  buttress,  and  sat  coiled 
up  on  the  pavement,  ready  for  a  desperate  spring".  Tlte  slave  stared 
at  him  :  but  Le  was:  az-custonjed  to  tlje  vagaries  of  phih«ophers  ;  and, 
t  ti?.T  tne  that  Le  was  not  bf^rn  in  tljat  station  of  life,  retirwl 
to  Eli  T>or:er’i  cell,  and  forgot  the  whole  matter. 

There  Ph2ainTnon  waited  a  full  half-hour.  It  seemed  Uf  him  hours, 
dayi,  years.  And  yet  Raphael  did  nc>t  return  ;  and  yet  no  guanls 
aip^eared.  Was  the  strange  Jew  a  traitor  V  Impossible! — his  face 
Lai  ehf^wn  a  desj^rate  earriestuess  of  terror,  as  intense  as  PJiiJam- 
inoxh  own . Yet  why  did  he  not  return  ? 

PerLajiS  he  Lad  found  out  tijat  the  strf^ets  were  clear  ;  their  mu- 

tual  lear-  rroundless . W}jat  meant  tltat  black  knot  of  mffti  nmtifi 

two  hundred  Ti>rds  hanging  aVmt  the  mouth  of  the  side  stre#rt, 
just  me  d<x>r  whicJj  led  m  her  lecttire-T^s>m  V  He  mcrved  to 

watch  them  :  they  Lad  vanished.  He  lay  down  again  and  waihal . 

There  they  were  again.  It  was  a  suspich^us  |s>st,  T'lmt  stre#rt  ran 
aioiig  the  1/ack  of  the  ^  favr/rite  haunt  of  monks,  r'^nn- 

laciDcatlng  by  mnumeT;>ble  entries  and  W^k  buildings  with  tl»e 
trreit  church  itself., . .  .A.nd  yet,  why  sh^/uld  there  l>e  a  kn<‘/t  of 
in '/nk- there  1  What  more  c//mmon  in  every  street  of  Alexandria? 
Be  trheii  to  iaueh  away  Lis  own  b^rs.  Ami  y«d  th<y  r}ta?ned,  by  the 
v^ry  inteni/ity  of  thinking  them,  inb>  c^rrtainty.  He  knew  that 
t'unething  terrhie  was  at  liand.  More  than  ^/m;e  he  out  frotn 

h.*  Ehug-piac'/j, — the  knot  ^/f  men  waj^  still  there  . ,  Jt  scanned  to 
have  increased,  to  draw  y>eare7.  If  they  found  him,  what  would  tlmy 
1*^0*  ?  Wljitt  dni  Le  care?  He  would  die  for  her,  if  it  came 

to  that., — not  that  it  C'/uid  ^y/;//e  t/.»  that  t  but  still,  he  must  speak  b> 
he.'; — Lemuel  wajTj  her.  Pass/mger  afhrr  j;ass*mger,  carriage  after 
cfcv';4if'f',  paess'/J  %)fni)U  t;/e  *A.ih*d  j  studer/t  after  stude#»t  entered  tiie 
>ect  .re  r'cyrn  ;  but  he  mrrer  s^jw  them,  mA  ibougb  they  j;f>.ssed  hint 
7'he  hun  rose  Llgijer  a/eJ  higinu',  ami  turruAl  Lis  whole  hlaiio 


/ 


■apon  tlie  comer  where  Philammon  LTonched.  "ill  "he  pavpmeac 
scorched  like  hot  iron,  and  his  eyes  were  Liaaaiied.  ’.w  ^e  'nlndiiiir 
glare :  bnt  he  ne\rer  heeiied  It.  His  whole  hearr.  md  ^esse.  snd 
slight,  were  riTeted  npon  rhac  weil-siiiown.  doer,  sspeermc  ^ 
open . 

Ai  last,  a  curricle,  glitteriuir  toK  silver.  Tattled  :extnd  me  .•erner 
and  stoppet-l  opposite  him.  She  must  oe  coming  now. 
had  vanished.  Perhaps  it  ^vus.  alter  aiL  a  fancy  or  his  own.  Hi'  . 
there  thev  were,  peeping  round  the  comer,  close  to  'he  eeture-rwm. 
— the  hell-hounds  I  A  slave  brouirhr  out  an  embroidered  cusnion. — 
and  then  Hvpatia  herself  came  forth,  looking  more  glorious  -iian  over  • 
her  lips  set'iu  a  sad,  him  smile  :  her  eyes  apiifted.  mouirnKT.  ‘tkcer. 
and  vet  eyutle,  dimmed  by  some  great  tn'vard  awe.  .us  ±  ler  5oill 
far  away  aloft,  and  face  to  face  with  Hod- 

In  a  moment  he  sprung  up  to  her.  wsiughir  her  robe  convnisiTeiy. 
threw  himself  on  his  knees  before  her. — 

“  Stop  1  Stay  !  You  are  going  to  destruction 

Calmlv  she  looked  down  upon  Tiiin. 

“  Accomplice  of  witches  1  \Youid  you  make  of  Uhtjons  ian^irer 
a  traitor  like  yourself  ” 

He  sprung  ii^,  stepped  back,  and  stood  stupened  with  shame  md. 
despair . 

She  believed  liim  guilty,  theu  I _ Dr  ^Tas  the  -vtLI  of 

The  plumes  of  the  horses  were  waving  iar  down  the  street-  oerore 
he  recovered  himself,  and  rushed  after  her.  shouting  he  mew  not 
what. 

It  was  too  late !  A  darlv  wave  of  men  rushed  frt>m  die -mibuscaa.e. 
surged  up  round  the  car. . .  .swept  for'vard. .  .  .sue  az&i  ^-ilsarreariH:! . 
and,  as  Philammon  folio wetl  breathless,  the  horses  galloped  nist  liHL 
madlv  homeward  with  the  empty  carriage. 

Whither  wore  they  drairgiug  her'*  Co  the  chesareuin,  "he  vTiuirh 
of  God  himself  f  Impossible':  VYiv-  thither,  of  ail  places  on  me 
earth?  Why  did  the  mob.  increasing  momentanLy  by  hurmreds,  'our 
down  upon  the  beach,  and  return  brandishing  dixiiis.  shells,  ragmenas 
of  pottery  ? 

!She  was  upon  the  church  steps  before  he  caught  them  -ir.  mvTsibie 
among  the  crowd ;  but  he  could  track  her  by  Hie  -iragmenss  vit  jesr 
dress. 

Where  were  her  gay  pupils  uoW*  Alas'  they  lad  .^amcaued 
themseH'es  shamefully  in  the  iluseum,  at  the  irsc  TtusU.  wnich  svs^Hct 
her  from  the  door  of  the  lecture'toom.  Cowanis  he  '-riiuid  save 
her  1 

And  he  struggled  in  vain  to  pierce  the  dtmse  mass  of  'oarabolattL 
and  monks,  who.  mingled  with  the  tish- 'v- no-^s  anvi  dwk'yv'rkers.  ear'- 
ed  and  yelled  around  their  vtcdm.  3uc  what  he  cc»uid  tiot  ho.  .un- 
other  and  a  weaker  did,— even  the  little  portc'r,  ^iinyuslv-^  w  'ue 
knew  how  Of  whence — he  burst  up  as  if  the  gn.>mLd  n  the  hicii 


836 


HYPATIA. 


est  of  tlie  crowd,  with  knife,  teeth,  and  nails,  like  a  venomous  wild¬ 
cat,  tearing  his  way  toward  his  idol.  Alas  !  he  was  torn  down  him¬ 
self,  rolled  over  the  steps,  and  lay  there  half  dead,  in  an  agony  of 
weeping,  as  Plnlammon  sprung  up  past  him  into  the  church. 

Yes  !  On  into  the  church  itself  !  Into  the  cool  dim  shadow,  with 
its  fretted  pillars,  and  lowering  domes,  and  candles,  and  incense,  and 
blazing  altar,  and  great  pictures  looking  from  the  walls  athwart  the 
gorgeous  gloom.  And  right  in  front,  above  the  altar,  the  colossal 
Christ  watching  unmoved  from  off  the  wall,  his  right  hand  raised  to 
give  a  blessing, — or  a  curse  ? 

On,  up  the  nave,  fresh  shreds  of  her  dress  strewing  the  holy  pave¬ 
ment, — up  the  chancel  steps  themselves, — up  to  the  altar, — right  un¬ 
derneath  the  great,  still  Christ  :  and  there  even  those  hellhounds 
paused . 

She  shook  herself  free  from  her  tormentors,  and,  springing  back, 
rose  for  one  moment  to  her  full  height,  naked,  snow-white  against 
the  dusky  mass  around, — shame  and  indignation  in  those  wide,  clear 
eyes,  but  not  a  stain  of  fear.  With  one  hand  she  clasped  her  golden 
locks  around  her  ;  the  other  long,  white  arm  was  stretched  upward 
toward  the  great  still  Christ,  appealing — and  who  dare  say,  in  vain  ? 
from  man  to  God.  Her  lips  were  open  to  speak  ;  but^fhe  words  that 
should  have  come  from  them  reached  God’s  ear  alone  ;  for  in  an  in¬ 
stant  Peter  struck  her  down,  the  dark  mass  closed  over  her  again.  .  .  . 
and  then  wail  on  wail,  long,  wild,  ear-piercing,  rung  along  the 
vaulted  roofs,  and  thrilled  like  the  trumpet  of  avenging  angels 
through  Philammon’s  ears. 

Crushed  against  a  pillar,  unable  to  move  in  the  dense  mass,  he 

essed  his  hands  over  his  ears.  He  could  not  shut  out  those  shrieks  ! 


When  would  they  end  ?  What  in  the  name  of  the  God  of  mercy 
were  they  doing?  Tearing  her  piecemeal?  Yes,  and  worse  than 
that.  And  still  the  shrieks  rung  on,  and  still  the  great  Christ  looked 
down  on  Philammon  with  that  calm,  intolerable  eye,  and  would  not 
turn  away.  And  over  his  head  was  written  in  the  rainbow,  “  I  am 
Hie  same,  yesterday,  to-day,  and  forever  !  ”  The  same  as  he  was  in 
Judaea  of  old,  Philammon?  Then  what  are  these,  and  in  whose 
temple  ?  And  he  covered  his  face  with  his  hands,  and  longed  to  die. 

It  was  over.  The  shrieks  had  died  away  into  moans,  the  moans  to 
silence.  How  long  had  he  been  there  ?  An  hour,  or  an  eternity  ? 
Thank  God,  it  was  over  !  For  her  sake, — but  for  theirs  ?  But  they 
thought  not  of  that  as  a  new  cry  rose  through  the  dome. 

“  To  the  Cinaron  !  Burn  the  bones  to  ashes  !  Scatter  them  into 
the  sea  !  ”. . .  .And  the  mob  poured  past  him  again . 

He  turned  to  flee  :  but,  once  outside  the  church,  he  sunk  exhausted, 
and  lay  upon  the  steps,  watching  witli  stupid  horror  the  glaring  of 
the  fire,  and  the  mob  who  leaped  and  yelled  like  demons  round  their 
Moloch  sacrifice. 

A  hand  grasped  his  arm  ;  he  looked  up  ;  it  was  the  porter, 


m 


And  tliis,  young  butcher,  is  the  Catholic  and  Apostolic  Church  !  ” 

“No  !  Eudaemon,  it  is  the  church  of  the  devils  of  hell  \”  And 
gathering  himself  up,  he  sat  upon  the  steps  and  buried  his  head 
within  his  hands.  He  would  have  given  life  itself  for  the  power  of 
weeping  :  but  his  eyes  and  brain  were  hot  and  dry  as  the  desert. 

Eudaemon  looked  at  him  awhile.  The  shock  had  sobered  the  poor 
fop  for  once. 

“  I  did  what  I  could  to  die  with  her  I  ”  said  he. 

‘  ‘  I  did  what  I  could  to  save  her  !  ”  answered  Philammon. 

“  I  know  it.  Forgive  the  words  which  I  just  spoke.  Did  we  not 
both  love  her  ?  ” 

And  the  little  wretch  sat  down  by  Philammon’s  side,  and,  as  the 
blood  dripped  from  his  wounds  upon  the  pavement,  broke  out  into  a 
bitter  agony  of  human  tears. 

There  are  times  when  the  very  intensity  of  our  misery  is  a  boon, 
and  kindly  stuns  us  till  we  are  unable  to  torture  ourselves  by 
thought.  And  so  it  was  with  Philammon  then.  He  sat  there,  he 
knew  not  how  long. 

“  She  is  with  the  gods,”  said  Eudaemon  at  last. 

“  She  is  with  the  God  of  gods,”  answered  Philammon  ;  and  they 
both  were  silent  again. 

Suddenly  a  commanding  voice  aroused  them.  They  looked  up, 
and  saw  before  them  Raphael  Aben-Ezra. 

He  was  pale  as  death,  but  calm  as  death.  One  look  into  his  face 
told  them  that  he  knew  all. 

“  Young  monk,”  he  said,  between  his  closed  teeth,  “  you  seem  to 
have  loved  her  ?  ” 

Philammon  looked  up,  but  could  not  speak. 

“  Then  arise,  and  flee  for  your  life  into  the  farthest  corner  of  the 
desert,  ere  the  doom  of  Sodom  and  Gomorrha  fall  upon  this  accursed 
city.  Have  you  father,  mother,  brother,  sister, — ay,  cat,  dog,  or  bird, 
for  which  you  care,  within  its  walls  ?  ” 

Philammon  started  ;  for  he  recollected  Pelagia . That  evening, 

so  Cyril  had  promised,  twenty  trusty  monks  were  to  have  gone  with 
him  to  seize  her. 

“  You  have?  Then  take  them  with  you,  and  escape,  and  remem¬ 
ber  Lot’s  wife.  Eudaemon,  come  with  me.  You  must  lead  me  to 
your  house,  to  the  lodging  of  Miriam  the  Jewess.  Do  not  deny.  I 
know  that  she  is  there.  For  the  sake  of  her  who  is  gone  I  will  hold 
you  harmless,  ay,  reward  you  richly,  if  you  prove  faithful.  Rise  I” 

Eudaemon,  who  knew  Raphael’s  face  well,  rose  and  led  the  way 
trembling  ;  and  Philammon  was  left  alone. 

They  never  met  again.  But  Philammon  knew  that  he  had  been  in 
the  presence  of  a  stronger  man  then  himself,  and  of  one  who  hated 
even  more  bitterly  than  he  himself  that  deed  at  which  the  very  sun,  it 
seemed,  ought  to  have  veiled  his  face.  And  his  words,  “  Arise  and 
flee  for  thy  life,”  uttered  as  they  were  with  the  stern  self-command 


338  HYPATIA. 

and  writhing  lip  of  compressed  agony,  rung  tlirougli  his  ears  like  tlie 
trump  of  doom.  Yes,  lie  would  dee.  He  had  gone  forth  to  see  the 
world,  and  he  had  seen  it.  Arsenius  was  in  the  right,  after  all. 
Home  to  the  desert  !  But  drst  he  would  go  himself,  alone,  to  Pela¬ 
gia,  and  implore  her  once  more  to  dee  with  him.  Beast,  fool,  that 
he  had  been,  to  try  to  win  her  by  force, — by  the  help  of  such  as 
these  !  God’s  kingdom  was  not  a  kingdom  of  fanatics  yelling  for  a 
doctrine,  but  of  willing,  loving,  obedient  hearts.  If  he  could  not  win 
her  heart,  her  will,  he  would  go  alone,  and  die  praying  for  ITer. 

He  sprung  from  the  steps  of  the  Csesareum,  and  turned  up  the 
street  of  the  Museum.  Alas  !  it  was  one  roaring  sea  of  heads  !  They 
were  sacking  Theon’s  house, — the  house  of  so  many  memories  !  Per¬ 
haps  the  poor  old  man  too  had  perished  !  Still — his  sister  !  H© 
must  save  her  and  dee.  And  he  turned  up  a  side  street  and  tried  to 
make  his  way  onward. 

Alas,  again  !  the  wdiole  of  the  dock  quarter  was  up  and  out. 
Every  street  poured  its  tide  of  furious  fanatics  into  the  main  river  ; 
and  ere  he  could  reach  Pelagia’s  house  the  sun  was  set,  and  close 
behind  him,  echoed  by  ten  thousand  voices,  was  the  cry  of,  “  Down 
with  all  heathens  !  Root  out  all  Arian  Goths  !  Down  with  idolatrous 
wantons  !  Down  with  Pelagia  Aphrodite  !  ” 

He  hurried  down  the  alley,  to  the  tower  door,  where  Wulf  had 
promised  to  meet  him.  It  was  half  open,  and  in  the  dusk  he  could 
see  a  figure  standing  in  the  doorway.  He  sprung  up  the  steps,  and 
found,  not  Wulf,  but  Miriam, 

“  Let  me  pass  !  ” 

“  Wherefore?  ” 

He  made  no  answer,  and  tried  to  push  past  her. 

“Fool,  fool,  fool  !”  whispered  the  hag,  holding  the  door  against 
him  with  all  her  strength.  “Where  are  your  fellow-kidnappers? 
Where  are  your  band  of  monks?” 

Philammon  started  back.  How  had  she  discovered  his  plan. 

“  Ay,  where  are  they  ?  Besotted  boy  !  Have  you  not  seen  enough 
of  monkery  this  afternoon,  that  you  must  try  still  to  make  that  poor 
girl  even  such  a  one  as  yourselves?  Ay,  you  may  root  out  your  own 
human  natures,  if  you  will,  and  make  yourselves  devils  in  trying  to 
become  angels  :  but  woman  she  is,  and  woman  she  •  shall  live  or 
die  !  ” 

“  Let  me  pass  !  ”  cried  Philammon,  furiously. 

“  Raise  your  voice, — and  I  raise  mine  ;  and  then  your  life  is  not 
worth  a  moment’s  purchase.  Fool,  do  you  think  I  speak  as  a  Jewess  ? 
I  speak  as  a  woman, — as  a  nun  !  I  was  a  nun  once,  madman, — the 
iron  entered  into  my  soul  ! — God  do  so  to  me,  and  more  also,  if  it 
enter  into  another  soul  while  I  can  prevent  it  !  You  shall  not  have 
her  !  I  will  strangle  her  with  my  own  hand  first  !  ”  And  turning 
from  him  she  darted  up  the  winding  stair. 

He  followed  :  but  the  intense  passion  of  th«  old  hag  hurled  her 


NEMESIS. 


onward  witli  tlie  stren^li  and  speed  of  a  young  Maenad,  Once  Pliil- 
ammon  was  near  passing  lier.  But  he  recollected  that  he  did  not 
know  his  way,  and  contented  himself  with  keeping  close  behind,  and 
making  the  fugitive  his  guide. 

Stair  after  stair  she  fled  upward,  till  she  turned  suddenly  into  a 
chamber  door.  Philammon  paused.  A  few  feet  above  him  the  open 
sky  showed  at  the  stair-head.  They  were  close,  then,  to  the  roof  ! 
One  moment  more,  and  the.  hag  darted  out  of  the  room  again,  and 
turned  to  flee  upward  still.  Philammon  caught  her  by  the  arm, 
hurled  her  back  into  the  empty  chamber,  shut  the  door  upon  her, 
and  with  a  few  bounds  gained  the  roof,  and  met  Pelagia  face  to 
face. 

“  Come  gasped  he  breathlessly,  “  Now  is  the  moment !  Come, 
while  they  are  all  below  !  ”  and  he  seized  her  hand. 

But  Pelagia  only  recoiled. 

“No,  no,”  whispered  she  in  answer  :  “I  cannot,  cannot, — he  has 
forgiven  me  all,  all !  and  I  am  his  forever  !  And  now,  just  as  he  is 
in  danger,  when  he  may  be  wounded, — ah,  heaven  ! — would  you  have 
me  do  anything  so  base  as  to  desert  him  ?  ” 

“Pelagia,  Pelagia,  darling  sister!”  cried  Philammon,  in  an 
agonized  voice,  “  think  of  the  doom  of  sin?  Think  of  the  pains  of 
hell  1  ” 

“  I  have  thought  of  them  this  day  :  and  I  do  not  believe  you  !  No, 
— I  do  not  1  God  is  not  so  cruel  as  you  say  1  And  if  he  were, — to 
lose  my  love,  that  is  hell  I  Let  me  burn  hereafter,  if  I  do  but  keep 
him  now  !  ” 

Philammon  stood  stupefled  and  shuddering.  All  his  own  early 
doubts  flashed  across  him  like  a  thunder-bolt,  when  in  the  temple- 
cave  he  had  seen  those  painted  ladies  at  their  revels,  and  shuddered, 
and  asked  himself.  Were  they  burning  for  ever  and  ever? 

“  Come  1  ”  gasped  he  once  again;  and,  throwing  himself  on  his 
knees  before  her,  covered  her  hands  with  kisses,  wildly  entreating  ; 
but  in  vain. 

“What  is  this?”  thundered  a  voice, — not  Miriam’s,  but  the 
Amal’s.  He  was  unarmed  :  but  he  rushed  straight  upon  Pliil- 
ammon. 

“  Do  not  harm  him  ! ”  shrieked  Pelagia  ;  “he  is  my  brother, — my 
brother  of  whom  I  told  you  !  ” 

“  What  does  he  here  ?”  cried  the  Amal,  who  instantly  divined  the 
truth. 

Pelagia  was  silent, 

“  I  wish  to  deliver  my  sister,  a  Christian,  from  the  sinful  embraces 
of  an  Arian  heretic  ;  and  deliver  her  I  will,  or  die  !  ” 

“  An  Arian  ?”  laughed  the  Amal.  “Say  a  heathen  at  once,  and 
tell  the  truth,  young  fool  !  Will  you  go  Avith  him,  Pelagia,  and  turn 
nun  in  the  sand-heaps?” 

Pelagia  sprung  toward  her  lover  ;  Philammon  caught  her  by  the 


S40 


HYPATIA. 


arm  for  one  last  despairing  appeal  ;  and  in  a  moment,  neitlier  knew 
how,  the  Goth  and  the  Greek  were  locked  in  deadly  struggle,  while 
Pelagia  stood  in  silent  horror,  knowing  that  a  call  for  help  would 
bring  instant  death  to  her  brother. 

It  was  over  in  a  few  seconds.  The  Goth  lifted  Philammon  like  a 
baby  in  his  arms,  and,  bearing  him  to  the  parapet,  attempted  to  hurl 
him  into  the  canal  below.  But  the  active  Greek  had  wound  himself 
like  a  snake  around  him,  and  held  him  by  the  throat  with  the 
strength  of  despair.  Twice  they  rolled  and  tottered  on  the  parapet  ; 
and  twice  recoiled,  A  third  fearful  lunge, — the  earthen  Avail  gave 
way  ;  and  down  to  the  dark  depths,  locked  in  each  other’s  arms,  fell 
Goth  and  Greek, 

Pelagia  rushed  to  the  brink,  and  gazed  downward  into  the  gloom, 
dumb  and  dry-eyed  with  horror,  TAvice  they  turned  over  together  in 

mid-air . The  foot  of  the  tower,  as  was  usual  in  Egypt,  sloped 

outward  toAvard  the  water.  They  must  strike  upon  that, — and  then  ! 

, , .  .It  seemed  an  eternity  ere  they  touched  the  masonry . The 

Amal  Avas  undermost . She  saAv  his  fair,  floating  locks  dash  against 

the  cruel  stone.  His  grasp  suddenly  loosened,  his  limbs  collapsed  ■, 
two  distinct  plunges  broke  the  dark,  sullen  Avater  ;  and  then  all 
was  still  but  the  awakened  ripple,  rapping  angrily  against  the  Avail, 
Pelagia  gazed  down  one  moment  more,  and  then,  with  a  shriek 
which  rung  along  roof  and  river,  she  turned,  and  fled  dowm  the  stairs 
and  out  into  the  night. 

Five  minutes  afterward,  Philammon,  dripping,  bruised,  and  bleed¬ 
ing,  was  craAvling  up  the  Avater-steps  at  tlie  loAver  end  of  the  lane, 
A  Avoman  rushed  from  the  postern-door,  and  stood  on  the  quay  edge, 
gazing  with  clasped  hands  into  the  canal.  The  moon  fell  full  on  her 
face.  It  was  Pelagia,  She  saw  him,  kneAV  him,  and  recoiled, 

“  Sister  ! — my  sister  !  Forgive  me  !  ” 

“Murderer!”  she  shrieked,  and,  dashing  aside  his  outspread 
hands,  fled  wildly  up  the  passage. 

The  Avay  was  blocked  with  bales  of  merchandise  ;  but  the  dancer 
bounded  over  them  like  a  deer  ;  Avhilo  Philammon,  half  stunned  by 
his  fall,  and  blinded  by  his  dripping  locks,  stumbled,  fell,  and  lay, 
unable  to  rise.  She  held  on  for  a  feAV  yards  toward  the  torch-lit  mob, 
Avhich  Avas  surging  and  roaring  in  the  main  street  above,  then  turned 
suddenly  into  a  side  alley,  and  vanished  ;  while  Philammon  lay 
groaning  upon  the  pavement,  Avithout  a  purpose  or  a  hope  upon  earth. 
Five  minutes  more,  and  Wulf  Avas  gazing  over  the  broken  parapet, 
at  the  head  of  tAventy  terrified  spectators,  male  and  female,  whom 
Pelagia’s  shriek  had  summoned. 

He  alone  suspected  that  Philammon  had  been  there  ;  and,  shudder¬ 
ing  at  the  thought  of  Avhat  might  have  happened,  he  kept  his  secret. 
But  all  kneAV  that  Pelagia  had  been  on  the  toAver  ;  all  had  seen  the 
Amal  go  up  thither.  Where  were  they  now?  And  Avhy  was  the 
little  postern-gate  found  open,  and  shut  only  just  in  time  to  prevent 
the  entrance  of  the  mob  ? 


l^EMEStS.  341 

Wulf  stood,  revolving  in  a  brain  but  too  well  practiced  in  such 
cases,  all  possible  contingencies  of  death  and  horror.  At  last, — 

“  A  rope  and  alight,  Sinid  !  ”  he  almost  whispered. 

They  were  brought,  and  Wulf,  resisting  all  the  entreaties  of  the 
younger  men  to  allow  them  to  go  on  the  perilous  search,  lowered 
himself  through  the  breach. 

He  was  about  two-thirds  down,  when  he  shook  the  rope,  and  called 
in  a  stifled  voice  to  those  above, — 

“  Haul  up.  I  have  seen  enough. 

Breathless  with  curiosity  and  fear,  they  hauled  him  up.  He  stood 
among  them  for  a  few  moments,  silent,  as  if  stunned  by  the  weight 
of  some  enormous  woe. 

“  Is  he  dead  ?  ” 

“  Odin  has  taken  his  son  home,  wolves  of  the  Goths  !  ”  And  he 
held  out  his  right  hand  to  the  awe-struck  ring,  and  burst  into  an 

agony  of  weeping . A  clotted  tress  of  long,  fair  hair  lay  in  his 

palm. 

It  was  snatched;  handed  from  man  toman . One  after  another 

recognized  the  beloved  golden  locks.  And  then,  to  the  utter  astonish¬ 
ment  of  the  girls  who  stood  round,  the  great  simple  hearts,  too  brave 

to  be  ashamed  of  tears,  broke  out,  and  wailed  like  children . Their 

Amal  !  Their  heavenly  man  !  Odin’s  own  son,  their  joy,  and  pride, 
and  glory  !  Their  “  Kingdom  of  heaven,”  as  his  name  declared 
him,  who  was  all  that  each  wished  to  be,  and  more,  and  yet  belonged 
to  them,  bone  of  their  bone,  flesh  of  their  flesh  !  Ah,  it  is  bitter  to  all 
true  human  hearts  to  be  robbed  of  their  ideal,  even  though  that  ideal 
be  that  of  a  mere  wild  bull,  and  soulless  gladiator. . . . 

At  last  Smid  spoke  : 

“  Heroes,  this  is  Odin’s  doom  ;  and  the  Allfather  is  just.  Had  we 
listened  to  Prince  Wulf  four  months  ago,  this  had  never  been.  We 
have  been  cowards  and  sluggards,  and  Odin  is  angry  with  his  chil¬ 
dren.  Let  us  swear  to  be  Prince  Wulfs  men,  and  follow  him  to¬ 
morrow  where  he  will  !  ” 

Wulf  grasped  his  outstretched  hand  lovingly, — 

No,  Smid,  son  of  Troll  !  These  words  are  not  yours  to  speak. 
Agilmund,  son  of  Cniva,  Goderic,  son  of  Ermenric,  5mu  are  Balts,  and 
to  you  the  succession  appertains.  Draw  lots  here,  which  of  you  shall 
be  our  chieftain.” 

“No  !  no  !  Wulf  !”  cried  both  the  youths  at  once.  “  You  are  the 
hero  !  you  are  the  Sagaman  !  We  are  not  worthy  ;  we  have  been 
cowards  and  sluggards,  like  the  rest.  Wolves  of  the  Goths,  follow 
the  Wolf,  even  though  he  lead  you  to  the  land  of  the  giants  !  ” 

A  roar  of  applause  followed. 

“  Lift  him  on  the  shield,”  cried  Goderic,  tearing  off  his  buckler. 
“Lift  him  on  the  shield  !  Hail,  Wulf  king  !  Wulf,  king  of  Egypt  !  ” 

And  the  rest  of  the  Goths,  attracted  by  the  noise,  rushed  up  the 
tower-stairs  in  time  to  join  in  the  mighty  shout  of  “  Wulf,  king  of 


842  HYPATIA. 

Egypt !  ” — as  careless  of  tlie  vast  multitude  wliicli  yelled  and  surged 
without,  as  boys  are  of  the  snow  against  the  window-pane, 

“  No  !”  said  Wulf,  solemnly,  as  lie  stood  on  the  uplifted  shield. 
‘‘If  I  be  indeed  your  king,  and  ye  my  men,  wolves  of  the  Goths,  to¬ 
morrow  we  will  go  forth  of  this  place,  hated  of  Odin,  rank  with  the 
innocent  blood  of  the  Alruna  maid.  Back  to  Adolf  ;  hack  to  our  own 
people!  Will  you  go?” 

‘  ‘  Back  to  Adolf  !  ”  shouted  the  men, 

“You  will  not  leave  us  to  be  murdered  I  ”  cried  one  of  the  girls. 
“  The  mob  are  breaking  the  gates  already  !” 

“  Silence,  silly  one  !  Men,  we  have  one  thing  to  do.  The  Amal 
must  not  go  back  to  the  Valhalla  without  fair  attendance.” 

“Not  the  poor  girls  ?”  said  Agilmund,' who  took  for  granted  that 
Wulf  would  wish  to  celebrate  the  AmaPs  funeral  in  true  Gothic 
fashion  by  a  slaughter  of  slaves, 

“  No . One  of  them  I  saw  behave  this  very  afternoon  worthy  of 

a  Vala.  And  they,  too, — they  may  make  heroes’  wives  after  all,  yet. 

.  . .  .Women  are  better  than  I  fancied,  even  the  worst  of  them.  No. 
Go  down,  heroes,  and  throw  the  gates  open  ;  and  call  in  the  Greek 
hounds  to  the  funeral  supper  of  a  son  of  Odin.” 

“  Throw  the  gates  open  ?  ” 

“  Yes.  Goderic,  take  a  dozen  men,  and  be  ready  ip.  the  east  hall. 
Agilmund,  go  with  a  dozen  to  the  west  side  of  the  court, — there  in 
the  kitchen  ;  and  wait  till  you  hear  my  war-cry.  Smid  and  the  rest 
of  you,  come  with  me  through  the  stables  close  to  the  gate, — as  silent 
as  Hela.” 

And  thev  went  down — to  meet,  full  on  the  stairs  below,  old  Miriam. 

Breathless  and  exhausted  by  her  exertion,  she  had  fallen  heavily 
before  Philammon’s  strong  arm  ;  and,  lying  half  stunned  for  a  while, 
recovered  just  in  time  to  meet  her  doom. 

She  knew  that  it  was  come,  and  faced  it  like  herself. 

“Take  the  witch  1  ”  said  Wulf,  slowly, — “take  the  corrupter  of 
heroes, — the  cause  of  all  our  sorrows  1  ” 

Miriam  looked  at  him  with  a  quiet  smile. 

“  The  witch  is  accustomed  long  ago  to  hear  fools  lay  on  her  the 
consequences  of  their  own  lust  and  laziness.” 

“Hew  her  down,  Smid,  son  of  Troll,  that  she  may  pass  the  Amal’s 
soul  and  gladden  it  upon  her  way  to  Niflheim.” 

Smid  did  it  :  but  so  terrible  were  the  eyes  which  glared  upon  him 
from  those  sunken  sockets,  that  his  sight  was  dazzled.  The  axe 
turned  aside,  and  struck  her  shoulder.  She  reeled,  but  did  not  fall. 

“It  is  enough,”  she  said,  quietly. 

“  The  accursed  Grendel’s  daughter  numbed  my  arm  !  ”  said  Smid. 
“Let  her  go  I  No  man  shall  say  that  I  struck  a  woman  twice.” 

“  Nidhogg  waits  for  her,  soon  or  late,”  answered  Wulf. 

And  Miriam,  coolly  folding  her  shawl  around  her,  turned  and  walked 
steadily  down  the  stair  ;  while  all  men  breathed  more  freely,  as  if 
delivered  from  some  accursed  and  supernatural  spell. 


34^ 


^EMESIS. 

And  now,”  said  Wiilf,  “  to  your  posts,  and  vengeance  !” 

The  mob  had  weltered  and  howled  ineffectually  around  the  house 
for  some  half-hour.  But  the  lofty  walls,  opening  on  the_street  only 
by  a  few  narrow  windows  in  the  higher  stories,  rendered  it  an  im¬ 
pregnable  fortress.  Suddenly  the  iron  gates  were  drawn  back,  dis¬ 
closing  to  the  front  rank  the  court,  glaring  empty  and  silent  and 
ghastly  in  the  moonliglit.  For  an  instant  they  recoiled,  with  a 
vague  horror  and  dread  of  treachery  ;  but  the  mass  behind  pressed 
them  onward,  and  in  swept  the  murderers  of  Hypatia,  till  the  court 
was  full  of  choking  wretches,  surging  against  the  walls  and  pillars 
in  aimless  fury.  And  then,  from  under  the  archway  on  each  side, 
rushed  a  body  of  tcill,  armed  men,  driving  back  all  in-comers  more  ; 
the  gates  slid  together  again  upon  their  grooves  ;  and  the  wild  beasts 
of  Alexandria  were  trapped  at  last. 

And  then  began  a  murder  grim  and  great.  From  three  different 
doors  issued  a  line  of  Goths,  whose  helmets  and  mail-shirts  made 
them  invulnerable  to  the  clumsy  weapons  of  the  mob,  and  began  hew¬ 
ing  their  way  right  through  the  living  mass,  helpless  from  their  close- 
packed  array.  True,  they  were  but  as  one  to  ten  ;  but  what  are  ten 
curs  before  one  lion?.  . .  .And  the  moon  rose  higher  and  higher,  star¬ 
ing  down  ghastly  and  unmoved  upon  that  doomed  court  of  the  furies, 
and  still  the  bills  and  swords  hewed  on  and  on,  and  the  Goths  drew 
the  corpses,  as  they  found  room,  toward  a  dark  pile  in  the  midst, 
where  old  Wulf  sat  upon  a  heap  of  slain,  singing  the  praises  of  the 
Amal  and  the  glories  of  Valhalla,  while  the  shrieks  of  his  lute  rose 
shrill  above  the  shrieks  of  the  flying  and  the  wounded,  and  its  wild 
waltz-time  danced  and  rollicked  on  swifter  and  swifter  as  the  old 
singer  maddened,  in  awful  mockery  of  the  terror  and  agony  around. 

And  so,  by  men  and  purposes  which  recked  not  of  her,  as  is  the 
wont  of  Providence,  was  the  blood  of  Hypatia  avenged  in  part  that 
night. 

In  part  only.  For  Peter  the  Header  and  his  especial  associates  were 
safe  in  sanctuary  at  the  Csesareum,  clinging  to  the  altar.  Terrified  at 
•'the  storm  which  they  had  raised,  and  fearing  the  consequences  of  an 
attack  upon  the  palace,  they  had  left  the  mob  to  run  riot  at  its  will  ; 
and  escaped  the  swords  of  the  Goths,  to  be  reserved  for  the  id.p’‘o 
awful  punishment  of  impunity. 


CHAPTER  XXX. 


EVERY  MAN  TO  HIS  OWN  PLACE, 

It  was  near  midniglit.  Raphael  had  been  sitting  some  three  hours 
in  Miriam’s  inner  chamber,  waiting  in  vain  for  her  return.  To  re¬ 
cover,  if  possible,  his  ancestral  wealth  ;  to  convey  it,  without  a  day’s 
delay,  to  Cyrene  ;  and,  if  possible,  to  persuade  the  poor  old  Jewess  to 
accompany  him,  and  there  to  soothe,  to  guide,  perhaps  to  convert  her, 
was  his  next  purpose  : — at  all  events,  with  or  without  his  wealth,  to 
flee  from  that  accursed  city.  And  he  counted  impatiently  the  slow 
hours  and  minutes  which  detained  him  in  an  atmosphere  which 
seemed  reeking  with  innocent  blood,  black  with  the  lowering  curse  of 
an  avenging  God.  More  than  once,  unable  to  bear  the  thought,  he 
rose  to  depart,  and  leave  his  wealth  behind  :  but  he  was  checked 
again  by  the  thought  of  his  own  past  life.  How  had  he  added  his 
own  sin  to  the  great  heap  of  Alexandrian  wickedness  !  How  had  he 
tempted  others,  pampered  others  in  evil  !  Good  God  !  how  had  he 
not  only  done  evil  with  all  his  might,  but  had  pleasure  in  those  who 
did  the  same  !  And  now,  now  he  was  reaping  the  fruit  of  his  own 
devices.  For  years  past,  merely  to  please  his  lust  of  power,  his  mis¬ 
anthropic  scorn,  he  had  been  making  that  wicked  Orestes  wickeder 
than  he  was  even  by  his  own  base  will  and  nature  ;  and  his  puppet 
had  avenged  itself  upon  him  !  He,  he  had  prompted  him  to  ask  Hy¬ 
patia’s  hand . He  had  laid,  half  in  sport,  half  in  envy  of  her  excel¬ 

lence,  that  foul  plot  against  the  only  human  being  whom  he  loved 
. . .  .and  he  had  destroyed  her  !  He,  and  not  Peter,  was  the  murderer 

of  Hypatia  !  True,  he  had  never  meant  her  death . No  ;  but  had 

he  not  meant  for  her  worse  than  death  ?  He  had  never  foreseen. .... 
No  ;  but  only  because  he  did  not  choose  to  foresee.  He  had  chosen 
to  be  a  god  ;  to  kill  and  to  make  alive  by  his  own  will  and  law  :  and 
behold,  he  had  become  a  devil  by  that  very  act.  Who  can — and 
who  dare,  even  if  he  could — withdraw  the  sacred  veil  from  those  bit¬ 
ter  agonies  of  inward  shame  and  self-reproach,  made  all  the  more  in¬ 
tense  by  his  clear  and  undoubting  knowledge  that  he  was  forgiven  ? 
What  dread  of  punishment,  what  blank  despair,  could  have  pierced 
that  great  heart  so  deeply  as  did  the  thought  that  the  God  whom  he 
had  hated  and  defied  had  returned  him  good  for  evil,  and  rewarded 
him  not  according  to  his  iniquities  ?  That  discovery,  as  Ezekiel  of 
old  had  warned  his  forefathers,  filled  up  the  cup  of  his  self-loathing. 

, . .  .To  have  found  at  last  the  hated  and  dreaded  name  of  God  :  and 

(344) 


EVERY  MAN  TO  MIS  OWN  PLAGE. 


345 


found  that  it  was  Love  ! ....  To  possess  Victoria,  a  living;,  human 
likeness,  however  imperfect,  of  that  God  ;  and  to  possesa  in  her  a 
home,  a  duty,  a  purpose,  a  fresh,  clear  life  of  righteous  laf/or,  per¬ 
haps  of  final  victory . That  was  his  punishment  ;  that  was  the 

brand  of  Cain  upon  his  forehead  ;  and  he  felt  it  greater  than  he  could 
bear. 

But  at  least  there  was  one  thing  to  be  done.  Where  he  had  sinned, 
there  he  must  make  amends  ;  not  as  a  propitiation,  not  even  as  a  res 
titution  ;  but  simply  as  a  confession  of  the  truth  which  he  had  found. 
And  as  his  purpose  shaped  itself,  he  longed  and  prayed  that  Miriam 
might  return,  and  make  it  possible. 

And  Miriam  did  return.  He  heard  her  pass  slowly  through  the 
outer  room,  learn  from  the  girls  who  was  within,  order  them  out  of 
the  apartments,  close  the  outer  door  upon  them  ;  at  last  she  entered, 
and  said  quietly, — 

“  Welcome !  I  have  expected  you.  You  could  not  surprise 
old  Miriam.  The  teraph  told  me,  last  night,  that  you  would  be 

here.”. ... 

Did  she  see  the  smile  of  incredulity  upon  Raphael’s  face,  or 
was  it  some  sudden  pang  of  conscience  which  made  her  cry 
out, — 

“. . .  .No  !  I  did  not  !  I  never  expected  you  !  I  am  a  liar,  a  miser¬ 
able  old  liar,  who  cannot  speak  the  truth,  even  if  I  try  !  Only  look 
kind  !  Smile  at  me,  Raphael ! — Raphael  come  back  at  last  to  his 
poor,  miserable,  villainous  old  mother  !  Smile  on  me  but  once,  my 
beautiful ,  my  son  !  my  son  !  ” 

And  springing  to  him,  she  clasped  him  in  her  arms. 

“Your  son?” 

“  Yes,  my  son  !  Safe  at  last  !  Mine  at  last !  I  can  prove  it  now  ! 
The  son  of  my  womb,  though  not  the  son  of  my  vows  !  ”  And  she 
laughed  hysterically.  ‘  ‘  My  child,  my  heir,  for  whom  I  have  toiled 
and  hoarded  for  three-and-thirty  years  !  Quick  !  here  are  my  keys. 
In  that  cabinet  are  all  my  papers, — all  I  have  is  yours.  Your  jewels 
are  safe, — buried  with  mine.  The  negro  woman,  Eudsemon’s  wife, 
knows  where.  I  made  her  swear  secrecy  upon  her  little  wooden  idol, 
and,  Christian  as  she  is,  she  has  been  honest.  Make  her  rich  for  life. 
She  hid  your  poor  old  mother,  and  kept  her  safe  to  see  her  boy  come 
home.  But  give  nothing  to  her  little  husband  ;  he  is  a  bad  fellow, 
and  beats  her. — Go,  quick  !  take  your  riches,  and  away  ! , . .  .No,  stay 
one  moment, — just  one  little  moment,  that  the  poor  old  wretch  may 
feast  her  eyes  with  the  sight  of  her  darling  once  more  before  she 
dies  !” 

“Before  you  die?  Your  son?  God  of  my  fathers,  what  is  the 
meaning  of  all  this,  Miriam  ?  This  morning  I  was  the  son  of  Ezra, 
the  merchant  of  Antioch  !  ” 

“  His  son  and  heir,  his  son  and  heir  !  He  knew  all  at  last.  We 
told  him  on  his  death-bed  !  I  swear  that  we  told  him^  and  he  adopted 
voul” 


846 


UYPATIA. 


“We!  Wlio?” 

“His  wife  and  I.  He  craved  for  a  cliild,  tlie  old  miser,  and  wt 
gave  him  one, — a  better  one  than  ever  came  of  his  family  But  In 
loved  you,  accepted  you,  though  he  did  know  all.  He  Avas  afraid  of 
being  laughed  at  after  he  was  dead, — afraid  of  having  it  known  that 
he  was  childless,  the  old  dotard  !  No,—  he  was  right, — true  Jew  in 
that,  after  all  I  ” 

“Who  was  my  father,  then?”  interrupted  Kaphael,  in  utter  be- 
Avilderment. 

The-  old  Avoman  laughed  a  laugh  so  long  and  Avild,  that  Eaphael 
shuddered, 

“  Sit  down  at  your  mother’s  feet.  Sit  down  .  .  .just  to  please  the 
poor  old  thing  I  E\"en  if  you  do  not  believe  her,  just  play  at  being 
her  child,  her  darling,  for  a  minute  before  she  dies  ;  and  she  will  tell 
you  all.  . .  .perhaps  there  is  time  yet !”.... 

And  he  sat  down . “  What  if  this  incarnation  of  all  wickedness 

Avere  really  my  mother  ?...  .And  yet — Avhy  should  I  shrink  thus 
proudly  from  the  notion  ?  Am  I  so  pure  myself  as  to  deserve  a  purer 
source?”.  .  .  .And  the  old  Avoman  laid  her  hand  fondly  on  his  head, 
and  her  skinny  fingers  played  with  his  soft  locks,  as  she  spoke 
hurriedly  and  thick, 

“  Of  the  house  of  Jesse,  of  the  seed  of  Solomon  ;  not  a  rabbi  from 
Babylon  to  Rome  dare  deny  that  !  A  king’s  daughter  I  am,  and  a 
king’s  heart  1  had,  and  have,  like  Solomon’s  own,  my  son  I.  , ,  .A 

kingly  heart . It  made  me  dread  and  scorn  to  be  a  slave,  a  plaything, 

a  soulless  doll,  such  as  Jewish  women  are  condemned  to  be  by  their 
tyrants,  the  men.  I  craved  for  wisdom,  renown,  power — power — 
power  ;  and  my  nation  refused  them  to  me  ;  because,  forsooth,  I  AA^as 

a  woman  1  So  I  left  them,  I  went  to  the  Christian  priests . They 

gave  me  Avhat  I  asked . They  gave  me  more.  .  .  .they  pampered  my 

woman’s  vanity,  my  pride,  my  self-Avill,  my  scorn  of  wedded  bondage, 
and  bade  me  be  a  saint,  the  judge  of  angels  and  archangels,  the  bride 
of  God  1  Liars  I  liars  1  And  so — if  you  laugh,  you  kill  me,  Raphael 
— and  so,  Miriam,  the  daughter  of  Jonathan — Miriam,  of  the  house 
of  David — Miriam,  the  descendant  of  Ruth  and  Rachab,  of  Rachel 
and  Sara — became  a  Christian  nun,  and  shut  herself  up  to  see  visions 
and  dream  dreams,  and  fattened  her  own  mad  self-conceit  upon  the 
impious  fancy  that  she  Avas  the  spouse  of  the  Nazarene,  Joshua  Bar- 

Joseph,  Avhoni  she  called  Jehovah-Ishi -  Silence  I  If  you  stop  me 

a  moment,  it  may  be  too  late.  I  hear  them  calling  me  already  ;  and 
I  made  them  promise  not  to  take  me  before  I  had  told  all  to  my  son, 
— the  son  of  my  shame  I  ” 

“  Who  calls  you?”  asked  Raphael ;  but  after  one  strong  shudder 
she  ran  on,  unheeding, — 

“  But  they  lied,  lied,  lied  I  I  found  them  out  that  day . Do  not 

look  up  at  me,  and  I  will  tell  you  all.  There  was  a  riot, — a  fight 
between  the  Christian  devils  and  the  Heathen  devils, — and  the  coq- 


EVERY  MAN  TO  HIS  PLAGE. 


347 


vent  was  sacked,  Raphael,  my  son  !  Sacked  .  .Then  I  found  out 

Iheir  blasphemy . O  God  !  I  shrieked  to  him,  Raphael  !  I  called 

on  him  to  rend  his  heavens  and  come  down, — to  pour  out  his  thunder¬ 
bolts  upon  them, — to  cleave  the  earth  and  devour  them, — to  save  the 
wretched,  helpless  girl  who  adored  him,  who -had  given  up  father, 
mother,  kinsfolk,  wealth,  the  light  of  heaven,  womanhood  itself,  for 
him, — who  worshiped,  meditated  over  him,  dreamed  of  him  night 

and  day . And  Raphael,  he  did  not  hear  me.  . .  .he  did  not  hear  me 

. . .  .did  not  hear  me  !.  . .  .And  then  I  knew  it  all  for  a  lie  !  a  lie  ! ” 

“And  you  knew  it  for  what  it  is  !  ”  cried  Raphael  through  his  sobs, 
as  he  thought  of  Victoria,  and  felt  every  vein  burning  with  righteous 
wrath. 

— “There  was  no  mistaking  that  test,  was  there?. ..  .For  nine 
months  I  was  mad.  And  then  your  voice,  my  baby,  my  joy,  my 
pride, — that  brought  me  to  myself  once  more  !  And  I  shook  off  the 
dust  of  my  feet  against  those  Galilaean  priests,  and  went  back  to  my 
own  nation,  where  God  had  set  me  from  the  beginning.  I  made  them 
— the  rabbis,  my  father,  my  kin — I  made  them  all  receive  me.  They 
could  not  stand  before  my  eye.  I  can  make  people  do  what  I  will, 
Raphael  !  I  could — I  could  make  you  emperor  now,  if  I  had  but 
time  left  !  I  went  back.  I  palmed  you  off  on  Ezra  as  his  Son,  I  and 
his  wife,  and  made  him  believe  that  you  had  been  born  to  him  while 

he  was  in  Byzantium . And  then — to  live  for  you  !  And  I  did  live 

for  you.  For  you  I  traveled  from  India  to  Britain,  seeking  wealth. 
For  you  I  toiled,  hoarded,  lied,  intrigued,  won  money  by  every 
means,  no  matter  how  base, — for  was  it  not  for  you  ?  And  I  have 
conquered  !  You  are  the  richest  Jew  south  of  the  Mediterranean, 
you,  my  son  I  And  you  deserve  your  wealth.  You  have  your 
mother’s  soul  in  you,  my  boy  !  I  watched  you,  gloried  in  you, — 
in  your  cunning,  your  daring,  your  learning,  your  contempt  for  these 
Gentile  hounds.  You  felt  the  royal  blood  of  Solomon  within  you  ! 
You  felt  that  you  were  a  young  lion  of  Judah,  and  they  the  Jackals 
who  followed  to  feed  upon  your  leavings  !  And  now,  now  !  Your 
only  danger  is  past  !  The  cunning  woman  is  gone, — the  sorceress 
who  tried  to  take  my  young  lion  in  her  pitfall,  and  has  fallen  into 
the  midst  of  it  herself  ;  and  he  is  safe,  and  returned  to  take  the 
nations  for  a  prey,  and  grind  their  bones  to  powder,  as  it  is  written, 

‘  He  couched  like  a  lion,  he  lay  down  like  a  lioness’s  whelp,  and  who 
dare  rouse  him  up  ?  ’  ” 

“  Stop  !  ”  said  Raphael,  “  I  must  speak  !  Mother  !  I  must !  As 
you  love  me,  as  you  expect  me  to  love  you,  answer  !  Had  you  a 
hand  in  her  death  ?  Speak  !  ” 

“Did  I  not  tell  you  that  I  was  no  more  a  Christian?  Had  I  re¬ 
mained  one,  who  can  tell  what  I  might  not  have  done  ?  All  I,  the 
Jewess,  dare  do  was — Fool  that  I  am  !  I  have  forgotten  all  this  time 
the  proof — the  proof ” 

“  I  need  no  |)roof,  mother,  Your  words  are  enough,”  said  Ra 


848 


HYPATIA. 


Eliael,  as  lie  clasped  lier  liand  between  liis  own,  and  pressed  it  to  liis 
liming  forehead.  But  tlie  old  woman  hurried  on, — “  See  !  see  the 
black  agate  which  you  gave  her  in  your  madness  !  ” 

“■  How  did  you  obtain  that  ?” 

“  I  stole  it, — stole  it,  my  son  ;  as  thieves  steal,  and  are  crucified  for 
stealing.  What  was  the  chance  of  the  cross  to  a  mother  yearning  for 
her  child  ? — to  a  mother  who  put  round  her  baby’s  neck,  three-and- 
thirty  black  years  ago,  that  broken  agate,  and  kept  the  other  half 
next  her  own  heart  by  day  and  night  ?  See  !  See  how  they  fit  ! 
Look,  and  believe  your  poor  old  sinful  mother  !  Look,  I  say  !  ”  and 
she  thrust  the  talisman  into  his  hands. 

“  Now,  let  me  die  !  I  vowed  never  to  tell  this  secret  but  to  you  ; 
never  to  tell  it  to  you,  until  the  night  I  died.  Farewell,  my  son  ' 
Kiss  me  but  once, — once,  my  child,  my  joy  !  Oh,  this  makes  up  for 
all  !  Makes  up  even  for  that  day,  the  last  on  which  I  ever  dreamed 
myself  the  bride  of  the  Nazarene  !  ” 

Raphael  felt  that  he  must  speak,  now  or  never.  Though  it  cost 
him  the  loss  of  all  his  w'ealth,  and  a  mother’s  curse,  he  must  speak. 
And  not  daring  to  look  up,  he  said  gently, — 

“  Men  have  lied  to  you  about  Him,  mother  ;  but  has  He  ever  lied  to 
you  about  himself  ?  lie  did  not  lie  to  me,  -when  he  sent  me  out  into 
the  world  to  find  a  man,  and  sent  me  back  again  to  you  with  the 
good  news  that  The  Man  is  born  into  the  world.” 

But  to  his  astonishment,  instead  of  the  burst  of  bigoted  indigna¬ 
tion  which  he  had  expected,  Miriam  answered  in  a  low,  confused, 
abstracted  voice, — 

“  And  did  he  send  you  hither  ?  Well,  that  was  more  like  what  I  Used 

to  fancy  him . A  grand  thought  it  is,  after  all, — a  Je\wthe  king  of 

heaven  and  earth  ! . Well,  I  shall  know  soon . I  loved  him 

once,.  . .  .and  perhaps.  . .  .perhaps  ...” 

Why  did  her  hand  drop  heavily  upon  his  shoulder  ?  He  turned,— a 
dark  stream  of  blood  was  flowing  from  her  lips  !  He  sprung  to  his 
feet.  The  girls  rushed  in.  They  tore  open  her  shawl,  and  saw  the 
ghastly  wound,  which  she  had  hidden  with  such  iron  resolution  to 
the  last.  But  it  was  too  late.  Miriam  the  daughter  of  Solomon  was 
gone  to  her  own  place. 

***** 

Early  the  next  morning,  Raphael  was  standing  in  Cyril’s  ante¬ 
room,  awaiting  an  audience.  There  were  loud  voices  within  ;  and 
after  awhile  a  tribune  whom  he  knew  well  hurried  out  muttering 
curses. 

“  What  brings  you  here,  friend?  ”  said  Raphael. 

“  The  scoundrel  will  not  give  them  up,”  answered  he,  in  an  under¬ 
tone. 

Give  up  whom  ?  ” 

The  murderers.  They  are  in  sanctuary  now,  at  the  Caesareum. 
Orestes  sent  me  to  demand  them  ;  and  this  fellow  defies  him  openly  !” 
And  the  tribune  hurried  out, 


EVERY  MAN  TO  HI8  OWN  PLAGE. 


349 


Raphael,  sickened  with  disgust,  half  turned  to  follow  him  ;  but  his 
better  angel  conquered,  and  he  obeyed  the  summons  of  the  deacon 
who  ushered  him  in. 

Cyril  was  walking  up  and  down,  according  to  his  custom,  with  great 
strides.  When  he  saw  who  was  his  visitor,  he  stopped  short  with  a 
look  of  fierce  inquiry.  Ra]3hael  entered  on  business  at  once,  with  a 
cold,  calm  voice. 

“  You  know  me,  doubtless  ;  and  you  know  what  I  was.  I  am  now 
a  Christian  catechumen.  I  come  to  make  such  restitution  as  I  can 
for  certain  past  ill  deeds  done  in  this  city.  You  will  find  among  these 
papers  the  trust  deeds  for  such  a  yearly  sum  of  money  as  will  enable 
you  to  hire  a  house  of  refuge  for  a  hundred  fallen  women,  and  give 
such  dowries  to  thirty  of  them  yearly  as  will  enable  them  to  find  suit¬ 
able  husbands.  I  have  set  down  every  detail  of  my  plan.  On  its 
exact  fulfillment  depends  the  continuance  of  my  gift.’' 

Cyril  took  the  document  eagerly,  and  was  breaking  out  with  some 
ccmmonplace  about  pious  benevolence,  when  the  Jew  stopped  him. 

“  Your  holiness’s  compliments  are  unnecessary.  It  is  to  your  office, 
not  to  yourself,  that  this  business  relates.” 

Cyril,  whose  conscience  was  ill  enough  at  ease  that  morning,  felt 
abashed  before  Raphael’s  dry  and  quiet  manner,  which  bespoke,  as 
he  well  knew,  reproof  more  severe  than  all  open  upbraidings.  So, 
looking  down,  not  without  something  like  a  blush,  he  ran  his  eye 
hastily  over  the  paper  :  and  then  said,  in  his  blandest  tone, — 

“  My  brother  will  forgive  me  for  remarking,  that  while  I  acknowl 
edge  his  perfect  right  to  dispose  of  his  charities  as  he  will,  it  is 
somewhat  startling  to  me,  as  Metropolitan  of  Egypt,  to  find  not  only 
the  Abbot  Isidore  of  Pelusium,  but  the  secular  Defender  of  the  Plebs, 
a  civil  officer,  implicated,  too,  in  the  late  conspiracy,  associated  with 
me  as  co- trustees.” 

“  I  have  taken  the  advice  of  more  than  one  Christian  bishop  on  the 
matter.  I  acknowledge  your  authority,  by  my  presence  here.  If  the 
Scriptures  say  rightly,  the  civil  magistrates  are  as  much  God’s  minis¬ 
ters  as  you  ;  and  I  am  therefore  bound  to  acknowledge  their  authority 
also.  I  should  have  preferred  associating*.the  prefect  with  you  in  the 
trust  ;  but  as  your  dissensions  with  the  present  occupant  of  that  post 
might  have  crippled  my  scheme,  I  have  named  the  Defender  of  the 
Plebs,  and  have  already  put  into  his  hands  a  copy  of  this  document. 
Another  copy  has  been  sent  to  Isidore,  who  is  empowered  to  receive 
all  moneys  from  my  Jewish  bankers  in  Pelusium.” 

“  You  doubt,  then,  either  my  ability  or  my  honesty?”  said  Cyril, 
who  was  becoming  somewhat  nettled. 

If  your  holiness  dislikes  my  offer,  it  is  easy  to  omit  your  name  in 
the  deed.  One  word  more.  If  you  deliver  up  to  justice  the  murder¬ 
ers  of  my  friend  Hypatia,  I  double  my  bequest  on  the  spot.” 

Cyril  burst  out  instantly, — 

“  Thy  money  perish  with  thee  !  Do  you  presume  to  bribe  me  into 
delivering  up  my  children  to  the  tyrant  ?  ” 


350 


EYPATIA. 


“  I  offer  to  give  you  tlie  means  of  showing  more  mercy,  provided 
that  you  will  first  do  simple  justice.” 

“  Justice  ?  ”  cried  Cyril.  “  Justice  ?  If  it  he  just  that  Peter  should 
die,  sir,  see  first  whether  it  was  not  just  that  Hypatia  should  die  ! 
Not  that  I  compassed  it.  As  I  live,  I  would  have  given  my  own  right 
hand  that  this  had  not  happened  !  But  now  that  it  is  done, — let  those 
who  talk  of  j  Listice  look  first  in  which  scale  of  the  balance  it  lies  !  Ho 
you  fancy,  sir,  that  the  people  do  not  know  their  enemies  from  their 
friends  ?  Do  you  fancy  that  they  are  to  sit  with  folded  hands,  while 
a  pedant  makes  common  cause  with  a  profligate,  fo  drag  them  back 
again  into  the  very  black  gulf  of  outer  darkness,  ignorance,  brutal 
lust,  grinding  slavery,  from  which  the  Son  of  God  died  to  free  them, 
from  which  they  are  painfully  and  slowly  struggling  upward  to  the 
light  of  day  ?  You,  sir,  if  you  be  a  Christian  catechumen,  should 
know  for  yourself  what  would  have  been  the  fate  of  Alexandria  had 
the  Devil’s  plot  of  two  days  since  succeeded.  What  if  the  people 
struck  too  fiercely  ?  They  struck  in  the  right  place.  What  if  they 
have  given  the  reign  to  passions  fit  only  for  heathens  ?  Recollect  the 
centuries  of  heathendom  which  bred  those  passions  m  them,  and 
blame  not  my  teaching,  but  the  teaching  of  their  forefathers.  That 

very  Peter . What  if  he  have  for  once  given  place  to  the  Devil, 

and  avenged  where  he  should  have  forgiven  ?  Has  he  no  memories 
which  may  excuse  him  for  fancying,  in  a  just  paroxysm  of  dread,  that 
idolatry  and  falsehood  must  be  crushed  at  any  risk  ? — He  who  counts 
back  for  now  three  hundred  years,  in  persecution  after  persecution, 
martyrs,  sir  !  martyrs — if  you  know  what  that  word  implies — of  his 
own  blood  and  kin  ;  who,  when  he  was  but  a  seven  years’  boy,  saw  Ills 
own  father  made  a  sightless  cripple  to  this  day,  and  his  elder  sister, 
a  consecrated  nun,  devoured  alive  by  swine  in  the  open  streets,  at  tUf 
hands  of  those  who  supported  the  very  philosophy,  the  very  gods, 
which  Hypatia  attempted  yesterday  to  restore.  God  shall  judge  such 
a  man  ;  not  I,  nor  you  !  ” 

“  Let  God  judge  him,  then,  by  delivering  him  to  God’s  minister.” 

“  God’s  minister  ?  That  heathen  and  apostate  prefect  ?  When  he 
has  expiated  his  apostasy  by  penance,  and  returned  pnblicly  to  the 
bosom  of  the  Church,  it  will  be  time  enough  to  obey  him  :  till  then 
he  is  the  minister  of  none  but  the  Devil.  And  no  ecclesiastic  shall 
suffer  at  the  tribunal  of  an  infidel.  Holy  Writ  forbids  us  to  go  to 
law  before  the  unjust.  Let  the  world  say  of  me  what  it  will.  I 
defy  it  and  its  rulers.  I  have  to  establish  the  kingdom  of  God  in 
this  city,  and  do  it  I  will,  knowing  that  other  foundation  can  no  man 
lay  t)ian  that  which  is  laid,  which  is  Christ.” 

“  Wherefore  you  proceed  to  lay  it  afresh.  A  curious  method  of 
proving  that  it  is  laid  already.” 

‘  ‘  What  do  you  mean  ?  ”  asked  Cyril,  angrily. 

“Simply  that  God’s  kingdom,  if  it  exist  at  all,  must  be  a  sort  of 
kingdom,  considering  who  is  the  King  of  it,  which  would  have  es- 


BYERT  MAN  TO  BIS  OWN  PLAGE. 


851 


tablislied  itself  without  your  help  some  time  since  ;  probably,  in¬ 
deed,  if  the  Scriptures  of  my  Jewish  forefathers  are  to  be  believed, 
before  the  foundation  of  the  world  ;  and  that  your  business  was  to 
believe  that  God  was  King  of  Alexandria,  and  had  put  the  Roman 
law  there  to  crucify  all  murderers,  ecclesiastics  included,  and  that 
crucified  they  must  be  accordingly,  as  high  as  Plaman  himself.” 

“  I  will  hear  no  more  of  this,  sir  !  I  am  responsible  to  God  alone, 
and  not  to  you  :  let  it  be  enough  that,  by  virtue  of  the  authority 
committed  to  me,  I  shall  cut  off  these  men  from  the  Church  of  God, 
by  solemn  excommunication  for  three  years  to  come.” 

“  They  are  not  cut  off,  then,  it  seems,  as  yet  ?” 

“  I  tell  you,  sir,  that  I  shall  cut  them  off  !  Do  you  come  here  to 
doubt  my  word  ?  ” 

“  Not  in  the  least,  most  august  sir.  But  I  should  have  fancied 
that,  according  to  my  carnal  notions  of  God’s  kingdom  and  the 
Church,  they  had  cut  off  themselves  most  effectually  already,  from 
the  moment  when  they  cast  away  the  Spirit  of  God,  and  took  to 
themselves  the  spirit  of  murder  and  cruelty  ;  and  that  all  which  your 
most  just  and  laudable  excommunication  could  effect,  would  be  to  in¬ 
form  the  public  of  that  fact.  However,  farewell  !  My  money  shall 
be  forthcoming  in  due  time  ;  and  that  is  the  most  important  matter 
between  us  at  this  moment.  As  for  your  client  Peter  and  his  fel¬ 
lows,  perhaps  the  most  fearful  punishment  which  can  befall  them  is 
to  go  on  as  they  have  begun.  I  only  hope  that  you  will  not  follow  in 
the  same  direction.” 

“I?”  cried  Cyril,  trembling  with  rage. 

“  Really,  I  wish  your  holiness  well  when  I  say  so.  If  my  notions 
seem  to  you  somewhat  secular,  yours — forgive  me — seem  to  me  some¬ 
what  atheistic;  and  I  advise  you  honestly  to  take  care  lest,  while 
you  are  busy  trying  to  establish  God’s  kingdom,  you  forget  what  it  is 
like,  by  shutting  your  eyes  to  those  of  its  laws  which  are  established 
already.  I  have  no  doubt  that,  with  your  holiness’s  great  powers, 
you  will  succeed  in  establishing  something.  My  only  dread  is,  that, 
when  it  is  established,  you  should  discover  to  your  horror  that  it  is 
the  Devil’s  kingdom,  and  not  God’s,” 

And  without  waiting  for  an  answer,  Raphael  bowed  himself  out  of 
the  august  presence,  and,  sailing  for  Berenice  that  very  day,  with 
Eudfemon  and  his  negro  wife,  went  to  his  own  place  ;  there  to  labor 
and  to  succor,  a  sad  and  stern,  and  yet  a  loving  and  a  much-loved 
man,  for  many  a  year  to  come. 

And  now  we  will  leave  Alexandria  also,  and,  taking  a  forward 

leap  of  some  twenty  years,  see  how  all  other  persons  mentioned  in 

this  history  went,  likewise,  each  to  their  own  place. 

*  *  *  -x-  * 

A  little  more  than  twenty  years  after,  the  wisest  and  holiest  man 
in  tlie  East  was  writing  of  Cyril,  just  deceased  : — 

“  His  death  made  those  who  survived  him  joyful  ;  but  it  grieved, 


352 


HYPATIA. 


most  probably,  the  dead  ;  and  there  is  cause  to  1‘ear,  lest,  finding  his 

presence  too  troublesome,  they  should  send  him  back  to  us . May 

it  come  to  pass,  by  your  prayers,  that  he  may  obtain  mercy  and  for¬ 
giveness,  and  that  the  immeasurable  grace  of  God  may  prevail  over 
his  wickedness.”. . .  . 

So  wrote  Theodoret,  in  days  when  men  had  not  yet  intercalated 
into  Holy  Writ  that  line  of  an  obscure  modern  hymn,  which  pro¬ 
claims  to  man  the  good  news  that  “  There  is  no  repentance  in  the 
grave.”  Let  that  be  as  it  may,  Cyril  has  gone  to  his  own  place. 
What  that  place  is  in  history  is  but  too  well  known.  What  it  is  in 
the  sight  of  Him  unto  whom  all  live  forever,  is  no  concern  of  ours. 
May  He  whose  mercy  is  over  all  his  works  have  mercy  upon  all, 
whether  orthodox  or  unorthodox.  Papist  or  Protestant,  who,  like 
Cyril,  begin  by  lying  for  the  cause  of  truth  ;  and,  setting  off  upon 
that  evil  road,  arrive  surely,  with  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees  of  old, 
sooner  or  later  at  their  own  place. 

True,  he  and  his  monks  had  conquered  :  but  Hypatia  did  not  die 
unavenged.  In  the  hour  of  that  unrighteous  victory,  the  Church  of 
Alexandria  received  a  deadly  wound.  It  had  admitted  and  sanctioned 
those  habits  of  doing  evil  that  good  may  come,  of  pious  intrigue,  and 
at  last  of  open  persecution,  which  are  certain  to  creep  in  wheresoever 
men  attempt  to  set  np  a  merely  religious  empire,  independent  of 
human  relationships  and  civil  laws  i—to  “  establish,”  in  short,  a 
“  theocracy,”  and  by  that  very  act  confess  their  secret  disbelief  that 
God  is  ruling  already.  And  the  Egyptian  Church  grew,  year  by  year, 
more  lawless  and  inhuman.  Freed  from  enemies  without,  and  from 
the  union  which  fear  compels,  it  turned  its  ferocity  inward,  to  prey 
on  its  own  vitals,  and  to  tear  itself  in  pieces,  by  a  voluntary  suicide, 
with  mutual  anathemas  and  exclusions,  till  it  ended  as  a  mere  chaos 
of  idolatrous  sects,  persecuting  each  other  for  metaphysical  proposi¬ 
tions,  which,  true  or  false,  were  equally  heretical  in  their  mouths, 
because  they  used  them  only  as  watchwords  of  division.  Orthodox 
or  unorthodox,  they  knew  not  God,  for  they  knew  neither  righteous¬ 
ness,  nor  love,  nor  peace . They  “  hated  their  brethren,  and  walked 

on  still  in  darkness,  not  knowing  whither  they  were  going,”.  . .  .till 
Amrou  and  his  Mohammedans  appeared  ;  and,  whether  they  dis¬ 
covered  the  fact  or  not,  they  went  to  their  own  place . 

Though  the  mills  of  God  grind  slowly,  yet  they  grind  exceeding  small  ; 

Though  He  stands  and  waits  with  patience,  with  exactness  grinds  He  all. 

And  so  found,  in  due  time,  the  philosophers  as  well  as  the  ecclesias¬ 
tics  of  Alexandria. 

Twenty  years  after  Hypatia’s  death,  philosophy  was  flickering 
down  to  the  very  socltet.  Hypatia’s  murder  was  its  death-blow.  In 
language  tremendous  and  unmistakable,  philosophers  had  been  in¬ 
formed  that  mankind  had  done  with  them  ;  that  they  had  been 
weighed  in  the  balances  and  found  wanting  ;  that  if  they  had  n© 


EVERY  MAN  TO  SIS  OWN  PLACE]  863 

* 

better  gospel  than  that  to  preach,  they  must  make  way  for  those  who 
had.  And  they  did  make  way.  We  hear  little  or  nothing  of  them  or 
their  wisdom  henceforth,  except  at  Athens,  where  Proclus,  Marinus, 
Isidore,  and  others,  kept  up  “the  golden  chain  of  the  Platonic 
succession,”  and  descended  deeper  and  deeper,  one  after  the  other, 
into  the  realms  of  confusion, — confusion  of  the  material  with  the 
spiritual,  of  the  subject  with  the  object,  the  moral  with  the  intel¬ 
lectual  ;  self-consistent  in  one  thing  only, — namely,  in  their  exclusive 
Pharisaism  ;  utterly  unable  to  proclaim  any  good  news  for  man  as 
man,  or  even  to  conceive  of  the  possibility  of  such,  and  gradually 
looking  with  more  and  more  complacency  on  all  superstitions  which 
did  not  involve  that  one  idea  which  alone  they  hated, — namely,  the 
Incarnation  ;  craving  after  signs  and  wonders,  dabbling  in  magic, 
astrology,  and  barbarian  fetichisms  ;  bemoaning  the  fallen  age,  and 
barking  querulously  at  every  form  of  human  thought  except  their 
own  ;  writing  pompous  biographies,  full  of  bad  Greek,  worse  taste,  and 
still  worse  miracles. . . . 

- That  last  drear  mood 

Of  envious  sloth  and  proud  decrepitude; 

No  faith,  no  art,  no  king,  no  priest,  no  God ; 

While  round  the  freezing  founts  of  life,  in  snarling  ring. 

Crouched  on  the  bare- worn  sod. 

Babbling  about  the  unretuming  spring. 

And  whining  for  dead  gods,  who  cannot  save, 

The  toothless  systems  shiver  to  their  grave. 

The  last  scene  of  their  tragedy  was  not  without  a  touch  of  pathos. 
...  .In  the  year  529,  Justinian  finally  closed,  by  imperial  edict,  the 
schools  of  Athens.  They  had  nothing  more  to  tell  the  world,  but 
what  the  world  had  yawned  over  a  thousand  times  before  ;  why 
should  they  break  the  blessed  silence  by  any  more  such  noises  ?  The 
philosophers  felt  so  themselves.  They  had  no  mind  to  be  martyrs, 
for  they  had  nothing  for  which  to  testify.  They  had  no  message  for 
mankind,  and  mankind  no  interest  for  them.  All  that  was  left  for 
them  was  to  take  care  of  their  own  souls  ;  and  fancying  that  they 
saw  something  like  Plato’s  ideal  republic  in  the  pure  monotheism  of 
the  Guebres,  their  philosophic  emperor  the  Khozroo,  and  his  holy 
caste  of  Magi,  seven  of  them  set  off  to  Persia,  to  forget  the  hateful 
existence  of  Christianity  in  that  realized  ideal.  Alas  for  the  facts  1 
The  purest  monotheism,  they  discovered,  was  perfectly  compatible 
with  bigotry  and  ferocity,  luxury  and  tyranny,  serails  and  bowstrings, 
incestuous  marriages  and  corpses  exposed  to  the  beasts  of  the  field 
and  the  fowls  of  the  air ;  and  in  reasonable  fear  for  their  own  necks, 
the  last  seven  Sages  of  Greece  returned  home,  weary-hearted,  into 
the  Christian  Empire  from  which  they  had  fled,  fully  contented  with 
the  permission  which  the  Khozroo  had  obtained  for  them  from  Jus¬ 
tinian,  to  hold  their  peace,  and  die  among  decent  people.  So  among 
decent  people  they  died,  leaving  behind  them,  as  their  last  legacy  to 
HYPATIA — 12 


354 


HYPATIA. 


mankind,  Simplicius’s  Commentaries  on  Epictetus’s  Enchiridion,  an 
essay  on  the  art  of  egotism,  by  obeying  which,  whosoever  list  may 
become  as  perfect  a  Pharisee  as  ever  darkened  the  earth  of  God. 

Peace  be  to  their  ashes  ! .  . .  .  They  are  gone  to  their  own  place. 

*  *  *  *  * 

Wulf,  too,  had  gone  to  his  own  place,  wheresoever  that  may  be. 
He  died  in  Spain  full  of  years  and  honors,  at  the  court  of  Adolph 
and  Placidia,  having  resigned  his  sovereignty  into  the  hands  of  his 
lawful  chieftain,  and  having  lived  long  enough  to  see  Goderic  and 
his  younger  companions  in  arms  settled  with  their  Alexandrian  brides 
upon  the  sunny  slopes  from  which  they  had  expelled  the  Vandals 
and  the  Suevi,  to  be  the  ancestors  of  “  bluest-blooded”  Castilian  no¬ 
bles.  Wulf  died,  as  he  had  lived,  a  heathen.  Placidia,  who  loved 
him  well,  as  she  loved  all  righteous  and  noble  souls,  had  succeeded 
once  in  persuading  him  to  accept  baptism.  Adolf  himself  acted  as 
one  of  his  sponsors  ;  and  the  old  warrior  was  in  the  act  of  stepping 
into  the  font,  when  he  turned  suddenly  to  the  bishop,  and  asked. 
Where  were  the  souls  of  his  heathen  ancestors  ?  “In  hell,”  replied 
the  worthy  prelate .  W  ulf  drew  back  from  the  font,  and  threw  his 

bear-skin  cloak  around  him . “  He  would  prefer,  if  Adolf  had  no 

objection,  to  go  to  his  own  people.”*  And  so  he  died  unbaptized, 
and  went  to  his  own  place. 

Victoria  was  still  alive  and  busy  :  but  Augustine’s  warning  had 
come  true, — she  had  found  trouble  in  the  flesh.  The  day  of  the  Lord 
had  come,  and  Vandal  tyrants  were  now  the  masters  of  the  fair  corn 
lands  of  Africa.  Her  father  and  brother  were  lying  by  the  side  of 
Kaphael  Aben-Ezra,  beneath  the  ruined  walls  of  Hippo,  slain,  long 
years  before,  in  the  vain  attempt  to  deliver  their  country  from  the 
invading  swarms.  But  they  had  died  the  death  of  heroes  ;  and  Vic¬ 
toria  was  content.  And  it  was  whispered,  among  the  downtrodden 
Catholics,  who  clung  to  her  as  an  angel  of  mercy,  that  she,  too,  had 
endured  strange  misery  and  disgrace.  .  .  .that  her  delicate  limbs  bore 
the  scars  of  fearful  tortures.  .  .  .that  a  room  in  her  house,  into  which 
none  ever  entered  but  herself,  contained  a  young  boy’s  grave  ;  and 
that  she  passed  long  nights  of  prayer  upon  the  spot,  where  lay  her 
only  child,  martyred  by  the  hands  of  Arian  persecutors.  Nay,  some 
of  the  few  who,  having  dared  to  face  that  fearful  storm,  had  sur¬ 
vived  its  fury,  asserted  that  she  herself,  amid  her  own  shame  and 
agony,  had  cheered  the  shrinking  boy  on  to  his  glorious  death.  But 
though  she  had  found  trouble  in  the  flesh,  her  spirit  knew  none. 
Clear-eyed  and  joyful  as  when  she  walked  by  her  father’s  side  on  the 
field  of  Ostia,  she  went  to  and  fro  among  the  victims  of  Vandal  ra¬ 
pine  and  persecution,  spending  upon  the  maimed,  the  sick,  the 
ruined,  the  small  remnants  of  her  former  wealth,  and  winning,  by 
her  purity  and  her  piety,  the  reverence  and  favor  even  of  her  bar- 


*A  fact. 


EVERY  MAN  TO  HIS  OWN  PLACE. 


355 


barian  conquerors.  Sbe  had  her  work  to  do,  and  she  did  it,  and  was 
content  ;  and  in  good  time  she  also  went  to  her  own  place. 

Abbot  Pambo,  as  well  as  Arsenins,  had  been  dead  several  years  ;  the 
abbot’s  place  was  filled,  by  his  own  dying  command,  by  a  hermit 
from  the  neighboring  deserts,  who  had  made  himself  famous  for 
many  miles  round,  by  his  extraordinary  austerities,  his  ceaseless 
prayers,  his  loving  wisdom,  and,  it  was  rumored,  by  various  cures 
which  could  be  only  attributed  to  miraculous  powers.  'While  still  in 
the  prime  of  his  manhood,  he  was  dragged,  against  his  own  en¬ 
treaties,  from  a  lofty  cranny  of  the  cliffs,  to  preside  over  the  Laura  off 
Scetis,  and  ordained  a  deacon  at  the  advice  of  Pambo,  by  the  bishop 
of  the  diocese,  who,  three  years  afterward,  took  on  himself  to  com¬ 
mand  him  to  enter  the  priesthood.  The  elder  monks  considered  it  an 
indignity  to  be  ruled  by  so  young  a  man  :  but  the  monastery  throve 
and  grew  rapidly  under  his  government.  His  sweetness,  patience, 
and  humility,  and,  above  all,  his  marvelous  understanding  of  the 
doubts  and  temptations  of  his  own  generation,  soon  drew  around  him 
all  whose  sensitiveness  or  waywardness  had  made  them  unmanage¬ 
able  in  the  neighboring  monasteries.  As  to  David  in  the  mountains, 
so  to  him,  every  one  who  was  discontented,  and  every  one  who  was 
oppressed,  gathered  themselves.  The  neighboring  abbots  were  at 
first  inclined  to  shrink  from  him,  as  one  who  ate  and  drank  with  pub¬ 
licans  and  sinners  :  but  they  held  their  peace  when  they  saw  those 
whom  they  had  driven  out  as  reprobates  laboring  peacefully  and 
cheerfully  under  Philammon.  The  elder  generation  of  Scetis,  too, 
saw,  with  some  horror,  the  new  influx  of  sinners  :  but  their  abbot 
had  but  one  answer  to  their  remonstrances, — “  Those  who  are  whole 
need  not  a  physician,  but  those  who  are  sick.” 

Never  was  the  young  abbot  heard  to  speak  harshly  of  any  human 
being.  “  When  thou  hast  tried  in  vain  for  seven  years,”  he  used  to 
say,  “  to  convert  a  sinner,  then  only  wilt  thou  have  a  right  to  suspect 
him  of  being  a  worse  man  than  thyself.”  That  there  is  a  seed  of 
good  in  all  men,  a  Divine  Word  and  Spirit  striving  with  all  men,  a 
gospel  and  good  news  which  would  turn  the  hearts  of  all  men,  if 
abbots  and  priests  could  but  preach  it  aright,  was  his  favorite  doc¬ 
trine,  and  one  which  he  used  to  defend,  when,  at  rare  intervals,  he 
allowed  himself  to  discuss  any  subject,  from  the  writings  of  his 
favorite  theologian,  Clement  of  Alexandria.  Above  all,  he  stopped, 
by  stern  rebuke,  any  attempt  to  revile  either  heretics  or  heathens. 
“  On  the  Catholic  Church  alone,”  he  used  to  say,  “  lies  the  blame  of 
all  heresy  and  unbelief  :  for  if  she  were  but  for  one  day  that  which 
she  ought  to  be,  the  world  would  be  converted  before  nightfall.”  To 
one  class  of  sins,  indeed,  he  was  inexorable, — all  but  ferocious  ;  to 
the  sins,  namely,  of  religious  persons.  In  proportion  to  any  man’s 
reputation  for  orthodoxy  and  sanctity,  Philammon’s  judgment  of  him 
was  stern  and  pitiless.  More  than  once  events  proved  him  to  have 
I'^en  unjust  :  when  he  saw  himself  to  be  so,  none  could  confess  his 


866 


HYPATIA. 


mistake  more  frankly,  or  humiliate  himself  for  it  more  bitterly  ;  but 
from  his  rule  he  never  swerved  ;  and  the  Pharisees  of  the  Nile 
dreaded  and  avoided  him,  as  much  as  the  publicans  and  sinners 
loved  and  followed  him. 

One  tiling  only  in  his  conduct  gave^ome.  handle  for  scandal,  among 
the  just  persons  who  needed  no  repentance.  It  was  well  known  that 
in  his  most  solemn  devotions,  on  those  long  nights  of  unceasing 
prayer  and  self-discipline,  which  won  him  a  reputation  for  super¬ 
human  sanctity,  ther-e  mingled  always  with  his  prayers  the  names  of 
two  women.  And  when  some  worthy  elder,  taking  couragfe  from  his 
years,  dared  to  hint  kindly  to  him  that  such  conduct  caused  some 
scandal  to  the  weaker  brethren,  “It  is  true,”  answered  he  ;  “tell 
my  brethren  that  I  pray  nightly  for  two  women  ;  both  of  them 
young  ;  both  of  them  beautiful  ;  both  of  them  beloved  by  me  more 
than  1  loved  my  own  soul ;  and  tell  them,  moreover,  that  one  of  the 
two  was  a  harlot,  and  the  other  a  heathen.”  The  old  monk  laid  his 
hand  on  his  mouth,  and  retired. 

The  remainder  of  his  history  it  seems  better  to  extract  from  an  un¬ 
published  fragment  of  the  Hagiologia  Nilotica  of  Graidiocolosyrtus 
Tabenniticus,  the  greater  part  of  which  valuable  work  was  destroyed 
at  the  taking  of  Alexandria  under  Amrou,  A.  D.  640. 

“  Now  when  the  said  abbot  had  ruled  the  monastery  of  Scetis 
seven  years  with  uncommon  prudence,  resplendent  in  virtue  and  in 
miracles,  it  befell  that  one  morning  he  was  late  for  the  divine  oflBce. 
Whereon  a  certain  ancient  brother,  who  was  also  a  deacon,  being 
sent  to  ascertain  the  cause  of  so  unwonted  a  defection,  found  the  holy 
man  extended  upon  the  floor  of  his  cell,  like  Balaam  in  the  flesh, 
though  far  differing  from  him  in  the  spirit,  having  fallen  into  a 
trance,  but  having  his  eyes  open  ;  who,  not  daring  to  arouse  him,  sat 
by  him  until  the  hour  of  noon,  judging  rightly  that  something  from 
heaven  had  befallen  him.  And  at  that  hour,  the  saint,  arising  with¬ 
out  astonishment,  said,  ‘  Brother,  make  ready  for  me  the  divine  ele¬ 
ments,  that  I  may  consecrate  them.’  And  he  asking:  the  reason 
wherefore,  the  saint  replied,  ‘  That  I  may  partake  thereof,  with  all 
my  brethren,  ere  I  depart  hence.  For  know  assuredly,  that  within 
the  seventh  day  I  shall  migrate  to  the  celestial  mansions.  For  this 
night  stood  by  me,  in  a  dream,  those  two  women  whom  I  love,  and 
for  whom  I  pray ;  the  one  clothed  in  a  white,  the  other  in  a  ruby- 
colored  garment,  and  holding  each  other  by  the  hand  ;  who  said  to 
me,  “  That  life  after  death  is  not  such  a  one  as  you  fancy  :  come, 
therefore,  and  behold  with  us  what  it  is  like,  ”  ’  Troubled  at  which 
words,  the  deacon  went  forth  :  yet,  on  account  not  only  of  holy 
©bedience,  but  also  of  the  sanctity  of  the  blessed  abbot,  did  not  hesi¬ 
tate  to  prepare  according  to  his  command  the  divine  elements  ;  which 
the  abbot,  having  consecrated,  distributed  among  his  brethren, 
reserving  only  a  portion  of  the  most  holy  bread  and  wine  ;  and  then, 
having  bestowed  on  them  all  the  kiss  of  peace,  he  took  the  paten 


EVERY  MAN  TO  HIS  OWN  PLACE. 


357 


and  chalice  in  his  hands,  and  went  forth  from  the  monastery  toward 
the  desert ;  whom  the  whole  fraternity  followed  weeping,  as  knowing 
that  they  should  see  his  face  no  more.  But  he,  having  arrived  at  the 
foot  of  a  certain  mountain,  stopped,  and,  blessing  them,  coinmanded 
them  that  they  should  follow  him  no  further,  and  dismissed  them 
with  these  words  :  ‘  As  ye  have  been  loved,  so  love.  As  ye  have 
been  forgiven,  so  forgive.  As  ye  have  been  judged,  so  judge.’  And 
so,  ascending,  was  taken  away  from  their  eyes.  Now  they,  return¬ 
ing  astonished,  watched  three  days  with  prayer  and  fasting  :  but  at 
last  the  elder  brother,  being  ashamed,  like  Elisha  before  the  entreat¬ 
ies  of  Elijah’s  disciples,  sent  two  of  the  young  men  to  seek  their 
master. 

“  To  whom  befell  a  thing  noteworthy  and  full  of  miracles.  For 
ascending  the  same  mountain  where  they  had  left  the  abbot,  they  met 
with  certain  Moorish  people,  not  averse  to  the  Christian  verity,  who 
declared  that  certain  days  before  a  priest  had  j^assed  by  them,  bear¬ 
ing  a  paten  and  chalice,  and,  blessing  them  in  silence,  proceeded 
across  the  desert  in  the  direction  of  the  cave  of  the  holy  Amina. 

“  And  they  inquiring  who  this  Amma  might  be,  the  Moors 
answered,  that  some  twenty  years  ago  there  had  arrived  in  those 
mountains  a  woman  more  l3eautiful  than  had  ever  before  been  seen 
in  that  region,  dressed  in  rich  garments  ;  who,  after  a  short  sojourn 
among  their  tribe, having  distributed  among  them  the  jewels  which  she 
wore,  had  embraced  the  eremitic  life,  and  sojourned  upon  the  highest 
peak  of  a  neighboring  mountain  ;  till,  her  garments  failing  her,  she 
became  invisible  to  mankind,  saving  to  a  few  women  of  the  tribe, 
who  went  up  from  time  to  time  to  carry  her  offerings  of^fruit  and 
meal,  and  to  ask  the  blessing  of  her  prayers.  To  whom  she  rarely 
appeared,  veiled  down  to  her  feet  in  black  hair  of  exceeding  length 
and  splendor. 

“  Hearing  these  things,  the  two  brethren  doubted  for  a  while  ;  but 
at  last,  determining  to  proceed,  arrived  at  sunset  upon  the  summit  of 
the  said  mountain. 

“  Where,  behold  a  great  miracle.  For  above  an  open  grave,  freshly 
dug  in  the  sand,  a  crowd  of  vultures  and  obscene  birds  hovered, 
whom  two  lions,  fiercely  contending,  drove  away  with  their  talons^ 
as  if  from  some  sacred  deposit  therein  enshrined.  Toward  whom 
the  two  brethren,  fortifying  themselves  with  the  sign  of  the  holy 
cross,  ascended.  Whereupon  the  lions,  as  having  fulfilled  the  term 
of  their  guardianship,  retired  ;  and  left  to  the  brethren  a  sight  which 
they  beheld  with  astonishment,  and  not  without  tears. 

“  For  in  the  open  grave  lay  the  body  of  Philammon  the  abbot  ;  and 
by  his  side,  wrapped  in  his  cloak,  the  corpse  of  a  woman  of  exceeding 
beauty,  such  as  the  Moors  had  described.  Whom  embracing  straight-  - 
ly,  as  a  brother  a  sister,  and  joining  his  lips  to  hers,  he  had  rendered  up 
his  soul  to  God  ;  not  without  bestowing  on  her,  as  it  seemed,  the 
most  holy  sacrament ;  for  by  the  grave-side  stood  the  paten  and 
the  chalice,  emptied  of  their  divine  contents. 


858 


HYPATIA. 


“  Having  beheld  wliicli  things  awhile  in  silence,  they  considered 
that  the  right  understanding  of  such  matters  pertained  to  the  judg¬ 
ment-seat  above,  and  was  unnecessary  to  be  comprehended  by  men 
consecrated  to  Grod.  Whereon,  filling  in  the  grave  with  all  haste, 
they  returned  weeping  to  the  Laura,  and  declared  to  them  the  strange 
things  which  they  had  beheld,  and  whereof  I  the  writer,  having  col¬ 
lected  these  facts  from  sacrosanct  and  most  trustworthy  mouths,  can 
only  say  that  wisdom  is  justified  of  all  her  children. 

“  Now,  before  they  returned,  one  of  the  brethren,  searching  the 
cave  wherein  the  holy  woman  dwelt,  found  there  neither  food,  furni¬ 
ture,  nor  other  matters  ;  saving  one  bracelet  of  gold,  of  large  si/.e 
and  strange  workmanship,  engraven  with  foreign  characters,  which 
no  one  could  decipher.  The  which  bracelet,  being  taken  home  to  the 
Laura  of  Scetis,  and  there  dedicated  in  the  chapel  to  the  memory  of 
the  holy  Amina,  proved  beyond  all  doubt  the  sanctity  of  its  former 
possessor,  by  the  miracles  which  its  virtue  worked  ;  the  fame  whereof 
spreading  abroad  throughout  the  Avhole  Thebaid,  drew  innumerable 
crowds  of  suppliants  to  that  holy  relic.  But  it  came  to  pass,  after 
the  Vandalic  persecution  wherewith  Huneric  and  Genseric  the  king 
devastated  Africa,  and  enriched  the  Catholic  Church  wfitli  innumera¬ 
ble  martyrs,  that  certain  wandering  barbarians  of  the  Vandalic  race, 
imbued  with  the  Arian  pravity,  and  made  insolent  by  success,  boiled 
over  from  the  parts  of  Mauritania  into  the  Thebaid  region.  Who, 
plundering  and  burning  all  monasteries,  and  insulting  the  consecrated 
virgins,  at  last  arrived  even  at  the  monastery  of  Scetis,  where  they 
not  only,  according  to  tlieir  impious  custom,  defiled  the  altar,  and 
carried  off  the  sacred  vessels,  but  also  bore  away  that  most  holy 
relic,  the  chief  glory  of  the  Laura, — namely,  the  bracelet  of  the  holy 
Amma,  impiously  pretending  that  it  had  belonged  to  a  warrior  of 
the  tribe,  and  thus  expounding  the  writing  thereon  engraven  : — 

‘For  Amalric  Amal’s  Son  Smid  Troll’s  Son  Made  Me.’ 

Wherein  whether  they  spoke  truth  or  not,  yet  their  sacrilege  did  not 
remain  unpunished  ;  for,  attempting  to  return  homeward  toward  the 
sea  by  way  of  the  Nile,  they  were  set  upon,  while  weighed  down 
with  wine  and  sleep,  by  the  country  people,  and  to  a  man  miserably 
destroyed.  But  the  pious  folk,  restoring  the  holy  gold  to  its  pris¬ 
tine  sanctuary,  were  not  unrewarded  ;  for  since  that  day  it  grows 
glorious  with  ever-fresh  miracles, — as  of  blind  restored  to  sight, 
paralytics  to  strength,  demoniacs  to  sanity,— to  the  honor  of  the 

orthodox  Catholic  Church,  and  of  its  ever-blessed  saints.” 

*  *  *  *  * 

So  be  it.  Pelagia  and  Philammon,  like  the  rest,  went  to  their  own 
place. . .  .to  the  only  place  where  such  in  such  days  could  find  rest 
...  .to  the  desert  and  the  hermit’s  cell,  and  then  forward  into  that 
fairy  land  of  legend  and  miracle,  wherein  all  saintly  lives  were  des¬ 
tined  to  be  enveloped  for  many  a  century  thenceforth. 


EVERY  MAN  TO  1118  OWN  PLAGE. 


353 


And  now,  readers,  farewell.  I  have  shown  you  New  Foes  under 
an  Old  Face, — your  own  likenesses  in  toga  and  tunic,  instead  of  coat 
and  bonnet.  One  word  before  we  part.  The  same  Devil  who 
tempted  these  old  Egyptians  tempts  you.  The  same  God  who  would 
have  saved  these  old  Egyptians  if  they  had  willed,  will  save  you,  if  you 
will.  Their  sins  are  yours,  their  errors  yours,  their  doom  yours,  their 
deliverance  yours.  There  is  nothing  new  under  the  sun.  The  thing 
which  has  been,  it  is  that  which  shall  be.  Let  him  that  is  without 
sin  among  you  cast  the  first  stone,  whether  at  Hypatia  or  Pelagia, 
Miriam  or  Raphael,  Cyril  or  Philammon. 


THE  CELEBRATED 


PIANOFORTES. 

The  demands  now  made  by  an  educated  musical  public  are  so  exacting  that  very  few 
Pianoforte  Manufacturers  can  produce  Instruments  that  can  stand  the  test  which  merit 
requires.  SOHMER  &  CO.,  as  Manufacturers,  rank_amongst  these  chosen  few,  who  are 
acknowledged  to  be  makers  of  standard  instruments.  In  these  days,  when  Manufacturers 
urge  the  low  price  of  their  wares  rather  than  their  superior  quality  as  an  inducement  te 
purchase,  it  may  not  be  amiss  to  suggest  that,  in  a  Piano,  quality  and  price  are  too  in 
separably  joined  to  expect  the  one  without  the  other. 

Every  Piano  ought  to  be  judged  as  to  the  quality  of  its  tone,  its  touch,  and  its  work.* 
manship  ;  if  any  one  of  these  is  wanting  in  excellence,  however  good  the  others  may  be, 
the  instrument  will  be  imperfect.  It  is  the  combination  of  these  qualities  in  the  highest 
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“  SOHMER”  its  honorable  position  with  the  trade  and  the  public. 

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The  Perfect  Shakespeare. 

"WOEEZS 

Carefully  prepared  from  the  earliest  and  more  modern  editions,  selected  where 
commentators  have  differed  as  to  the  Sense  of  obscure  or  doubtful  passages,  from 
those  readings  which  the  ablest  critics  believe  to  be  the  most  Shakesperean  and  best 
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We  have  used  the  term  '''' Perfecf  as  applicable  to  this  edition,  and  any  one 
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There  are  numerous  editions  oi  this  wonderful  writer’s  works,  got  up  in  all 
styles,  and  at  every  price.  But,  unfortunately  they  are  all  more  or  less  faulty. 

From  some  editions  many  of  the  strongest  passages  are  omitted  in  deference  to 
squeamish  namby-pambyism.  In  other  editions  some  fanciful  critic  has  tried  to 
improve  the  language  of  the  mighty  master — as  if  a  rushlight  could  add  lustre  to 
the  blazing  beams  of  the  noonday  sun. 

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A  ll  the  Poems — all  the  Plays — all  the  Characters — all  the  Language — are  given  un¬ 
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It  is  not  necessary  at  this  late  day  to  say  aught  in  praise  of  Shakespeare’s  works; 
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needs  no  eT"'ogy  from  meaner  men. 

IP  YOU  ilAVE  BUT  CUE  BOOK  LET  THAT  BOOK  BE  “SHAKESPEAEE.” 

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